Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 1026, Marrying Young.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 1026.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
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This episode is a dialogue between Irene and Ken about people getting married.
Let's get started.
They're too young.
Marrying young poses all kinds of problems.
Such as?
Such as the two of them lacking maturity.
They may think it's fun to play house right now, but they're not prepared to face the realities and responsibilities of matrimony.
I think you're selling them short.
They've been dating for two years, and there's no ideal age for marriage.
Yes, but we all know that marrying young will doom them to a life of regrets.
That's a bit harsh, don't you think?
A lot of people who marry young have successful marriages.
I like the idea of growing old with your spouse. you can reach many of life's milestones together.
Like reaching the legal drinking age?
Don't be facetious.
Getting married will give them stability and someone to lean on.
I think they'll be great as a married couple.
Well, I hope they beat the odds. or at least learn a lot for their second marriages.
We begin this dialogue with Irene saying to Ken, Damon and his girlfriend just got engaged.
They're planning on getting married soon.
To get engaged, E-N-G-A-G-E-D, means to promise and make plans to marry someone.
Normally, you get engaged... at least a few months before you get married.
Some people get engaged a year or even more before they actually do marry.
But to be engaged means to be promised, if you will, to another that you have promised to marry another person.
Irene says that Damon and his girlfriend are planning on getting married this summer.
To get married, of course, means to become husband and wife, to be legally recognized as a married couple.
In many places, marriage is both a civil, that is, government action, as well as a religious action.
You may get married in a church or a temple or some other religious institution.
You can also get married by going down to the government office and getting something called a marriage license.
One does not necessarily imply the other.
That is just because you get married by the government doesn't mean you're married in a religious sense.
You can have one without the other or both.
However, in the US, if you are married by someone who is considered a religious leader, such as a rabbi or a minister or priest, you will be considered married by the government as well.
The government allows religious leaders, if you will, to officially witness the marriage of two people.
But let's get back to our story and Damon and his girlfriend.
Ken says to Irene, they're too young.
Marrying young poses all kinds of problems.
To pose, P-O-S-E, means to present.
We often use this verb when talking about problems.
You'll hear people say, this poses a problem for us.
Meaning, this introduces...
Ken believes that marrying young, getting married when you are young, poses all kinds of problems.
We're not exactly sure what Ken means by young here.
Irene asks what kind of problems marrying young poses.
She says such as... meaning she's asking Ken to give her some examples.
Ken says, such as the two of them lacking maturity.
Maturity M-A-T-U-R-I-T-Y is having the outlook and perspective of a responsible person An adult, if you will.
We talk about children maturing.
They're getting older, and we hope getting wiser.
Teenagers often lack maturity.
That is, they don't have the responsible perspective of an adult.
Ken says they may think it's fun to play house right now.
The expression to play house H-O-U-S-E means to, in a way, pretend that you're living together.
It's a game that children sometimes play.
When little girls get together and play house...
They pretend as though they are wives and mothers or women who are living in their own house and responsible for the house.
And so they do things that might traditionally be done by someone who is married.
So Ken is making a little joke here.
He's saying that Damon and his girlfriend are plain house, just like a child would, even though the child doesn't understand the full responsibility of being married.
Ken says that these two are not prepared to face the realities and responsibilities of matrimony.
To face F-A-S-E something means to understand it and to deal with it, to be able to we might also say confront something.
You have to look at a difficult situation and figure out how to deal with it.
The word matrimony, M-A-T-R-I-M-O-N-Y, means marriage.
It's the state of being married.
Irene says that she thinks Ken is selling them short.
To sell someone short means... to underestimate someone's good qualities, to think someone is worse than they really are.
In this case Irene thinks that Ken is selling Damon and his girlfriend short by saying that they are not mature enough to get married.
Irene says they've been dating for two years and there's no ideal age for marriage.
Ideal, I-D-E-A-L, here means perfect or completely appropriate age.
The ideal age to get married would be the best age to get married.
Here in the United States in recent years, people have been getting married later and later.
And in many cases, not getting married at all.
But back to our fictional dialogue.
Ken says, yes, but we all know that marrying young will doom them to a life of regrets.
To doom someone is to make your future very dark.
If you are doomed, something very bad will happen to you in the future, maybe even death.
Of course, death will happen to all of us sometime in the future.
I hope not too soon.
At least, not for me.
Ken thinks that marrying young will basically ruin Damon and his girlfriend's lives.
It will doom them, he says, to a life of regrets.
Regrets, R-E-G-R-E-T-S, are things that you wish you had not done.
For example, I regret not talking to my neighbor last week.
I wish I had spoken with him.
To regret something as a verb means to feel badly that you didn't do a certain thing, or perhaps that you did do a certain thing.
Here it's being used as a noun, meaning that situation where you feel badly about something that you did or didn't do.
I regret not going up to that beautiful girl and asking her for her telephone number.
That's something I did a lot of when I was in my 20s.
I finally got a little bit smarter and decided to start asking women out on dates.
But that wasn't until after I was 30, really.
I'm someone who married very late in life.
Well, later than the average man marries in the U.S.
Anyway, it's not about me, is it, really?
It's about our dialogue.
So back to the dialogue.
Irene says to Ken, "'That's a bit harsh, don't you think?'
Ken is saying that poor Damon and his girlfriend will have a terrible life.
And she's saying, no, that's a bit harsh.
H-A-R-S-H.
To be harsh means to be mean, to be too critical.
She continues, a lot of people who marry young have successful marriages.
I like the idea of growing old with your spouse.
To grow old means to experience life as you get older.
All of us, of course, grow old.
Irene is talking about growing old with your spouse, the person you're married to.
She says A milestone M-I-L-E-S-T-O-N-E is an important event or accomplishment in life.
In this case,
You can have a milestone in a project at work, things that you want to get done by this date or this date.
Ken says like reaching the legal drinking age.
Irene is talking about important events in one's life and Ken gives an example of one the legal drinking age.
In the US, the legal drinking age is 21, which means that Damon and his girlfriend are not yet 21 years old.
Normally people wait until after they're 21 to get married, and that's probably why Ken is, in a way, making a joke with Irene, saying these kids are so young they can't even drink legally.
But Irene says, don't be facetious.
To be facetious, F-A-C-E-T-I-O-U-S, means to not take something seriously, to joke about something.
Irene says getting married will give them stability and someone to lean on.
Stability, S-T-A-B-I-L-I-T-Y, means is a position where things don't change.
Irene is saying that if these two people get married, they will have stability...
And each will have someone to lean on.
To lean L-E-A-N on someone is a phrasal verb meaning to rely on someone, to depend on someone for support and advice and help.
Ken says, well...
To beat, B-E-A-T, the odds, O-D-D-S, means to do better than what you might expect.
He's suggesting that it will be difficult for them to have a happy marriage, since a lot of people who get married very young sometimes don't have successful marriages, although I'm not sure exactly what the statistics are on that.
Really,
But in any case Ken thinks that they don't have a very good chance at a marriage if they get married very young.
He then ends by saying, or at least learn a lot for their second marriages.
He's suggesting that their first marriage won't last, that is, they'll get divorced and then they'll marry again.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
They're too young.
Marrying young poses all kinds of problems.
Such as?
Such as the two of them lacking maturity.
They may think it's fun to play house right now, but they're not prepared to face the realities and responsibilities of matrimony.
I think you're selling them short.
They've been dating for two years and there's no ideal age for marriage.
Yes, but we all know that marrying young will doom them to a life of regrets.
That's a bit harsh, don't you think?
A lot of people who marry young have successful marriages.
I like the idea of growing old with your spouse.
You can reach many of life's milestones together.
Like reaching the legal drinking age?
Don't be facetious.
Getting married will give them stability and someone to lean on.
I think they'll be great as a married couple.
Well, I hope they beat the odds, or at least learn a lot for their second marriages.
We have the ideal script writer here at ESL Podcast, our very own Dr. Lucy Say.
Thank you, Lucy.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2014 by the Center for Educational Development.
