Curiosity About Benjamin Button

Amidst a week-end of pouring rain and blustery wind (blech), house cleaning (why can't I like house cleaning? Life would probably be easier if I did), back ouchiness and other such grumpiness-inducing things, my family watched The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I know that the movie is based on the short story by F Scott Fitzgerald and though I know I've read dozens of his short stories, I'm not certain if I've read that one.

As a person who hasn't read the story I'd like to throw out a question about it to people who may have done so: is the short story meant to be a metaphor for the stages of marriage? My assumption is that the point of the short story was to speak to the stages of marriage as demonstrated by the Benjamin & Daisy characters in the movie: in the beginning, both parties are young and on a voyage of discovery. In the next phase, the man is the more mature and worldly party and may even represent a hidebound, father-type figure to the woman. The woman then grows and changes, and in some ways leaves the husband behind. Then comes the halcyon period where they meet in the middle on a mature playing field. This is followed by the denouement where the man acts progressively like he can re-capture the point when his sexual attractiveness was cresting, then like an adolescent, and finally like an infant.

I take the movie that way. Or I guess what I'm trying to say is that I assume that the short story was meant to be taken that way and though the movie took it in a more literal direction, the metaphor from the story still seems to come through regardless and hence I take the movie that way.

Has anyone read the short story and agree (or disagree)? Or is it more likely that I've leapt to this assumption about a metaphor thanks to what I believe Fitzgerald felt about his own marriage and/or marriage in general?

[Yes, I know I can likely answer this question myself if I just read the damned story - but this is faster and it's Monday and I'm lazy.]