Another Damn Wedding

It’s a stage of life we all go through: THE WEDDING PHASE.

It lasts three to four years and by the end of it nearly everybody you know has married off.

For me, THE WEDDING PHASE started with my Christian friends (presumably desperate to do the deed). Then the rest fell like dominoes.

Wedding invites came flying out of the letterbox. Ninja stars, straight for the throat.

Even friends who vowed they would never, ever get hitched – I’ve witness them fall, one-by-one, like soldiers on the battlefield of love. As flies in a fog of mortein.

Wedding after wedding after wedding.

Truly, it’s been a blood-bath of love. A love-bath, if you will, a mish-mash of tearful vows, candy bars, mid-range wine and bubbles (of both types).

Well, now it’s my turn.

As I write this, I’m just starting to prepare to enter the wedding fray this popularised institution of marriage.

It was inevitable that this should happen, for I have found the perfect man and our love sparkles like unicorns prancing on a fluro rainbow etc etc etc.

Anyway, we’ve started planning for THE BIG DAY and a few things have taken me aback.

Firstly: some brides-to-be are crazy.

Here are some excerpts from a forum on a popular wedding website. The title of the thread is: “Bothered Brides: Share your concerns and grievances with other to-be-wed”. (Not even kidding)

Seriously, it’s gold. Take a look:

“Ok so I thought I had been going pretty well with all the planning up until now but the family stress has caught up with us and now we are just about ready to walk away from it all! First of all, my mum has been coming up with ideas for the wedding from when we first got engaged that just don’t fit with our theme at all (she keeps coming up with rustic ideas and our theme is modern-vintage-glam so it just doesn’t work).” – Lucy73469 (SA)

Sorry – what? What the hell is modern-vintage-glam. Definitely, you should chuck in the towel and elope, Lucy73469.

“There is this girl who is engaged to my fiance’s best man and she is driving me mental. First she booked her wedding days after ours, and then as she was a friend all we talked about was weddings… then she stole all my ideas… even my colour scheme, the same table centrepieces –  EVEN THE SAME WEDDING INVITES! Now I have to recreate my whole theme, pick new invites and everything…” – bs942 (NSW)

Oh no – NOT THE CENTRE PIECES!

With this next one, please note that it was posted in October 2013:

“My Maid of Honour (and my closest friend) is my biggest concern at the  moment. She has been such a huge let-down so far and I’m asking whether I  should let her go, or just keep going with things in hope they get  better??? (My wedding is in mid 2015). She is not very interested in  helping me plan at all – and thinks coming with me to 3 Bridal Fairs  (that she’s not even interested in) is pushing her duties.” –**K** (NSW)

Yes. You are ‘pushing her duties’. Your wedding is TWO YEARS AWAY.

I could go on with such examples. But I won’t. I will simply promise myself (with wordpress as my witness) that I will keep a level head throughout this whole venture.

Moving on now.

The second thing that’s taken me by surprise: the price. My gosh. Every wedding-related expense is precisely double what I initially estimate. And then some.

Thirdly, wedding dresses are entirely intimidating. Even after a glass or two of champagne (mum’s idea).

Seriously, these dresses are huge and fluffy and extremely heavy. And oh so white.

In the dead of the night, they come to life and dance with each other between the racks. As far as I know, an entire population of oompa-loompas is living within the endless layers of tulle.

So as you can imagine, when confronted with a room full of these white monstrosities, the invitation to “try something on!” is actually quite fearsome.

I, for one, do not want to disturb a colony of oompa-loompas. Not me. No way. Leave them be.

And just quietly, I have no idea about how one would even go about “trying something on!” I just don’t understand how that would work. I don’t want to drown.

At this stage, I’m thinking the oompa-loompas could walk the empty beast-garment down the aisle first. Then I could simply walk down behind it, in the safety of my own, non-threatening, clothes.

Everyone is obliged to gasp and tell me I’m beautiful no matter what I wear. Right? Right.

And lastly, I am waaaayyy behind schedule. Apparently.

Service provider: So, when’s the big day?

Me: August.

Service provider: Next year?

Me: Ah no – this year.

Service provider:

But I’m not too worried. We have a celebrant, so we’ll definitely be married by the end of the day, which is the whole point of the thing, after all.

Right? Right.