Vintage QotD: Here Comes The Bride

What was the last wedding you went to?  Were you in the wedding?

Gosh.  I went to so many weddings in my late 20s, and I was a bridesmaid in so many of those weddings... Each of them cost me hundreds, and on occasion, thousands of dollars.  I was in one wedding where the bridesmaid dress was almost $400, the plane ticket was $600, the shoes were $100, the hotel room was $150 a night, the rental car, the gift... All added up, it came to almost two grand.  For somebody else's wedding. 

After that, I re-evaluated my stance on weddings.  I started saying, "Thanks, but I can't" when people asked me to be in their wedding.  In fact, for the most part, I stopped going to weddings at all.  I figured, I wish them the best, but I'm going to save them the money of feeding me, and anyway, the couples were all in their thirties and didn't need any more houseware gifts or anything.  For the most part, all of the people I knew getting married were better off than me.  Plus, then they'd get pregnant and I'd have to go to the baby showers and buy even more crap.   In the meanwhile, I was single and not moving toward couple-dom in any way.  (I was single for 10 years before I met Allen.  I dated, but I never once had a serious boyfriend in those 10 years.)

So I stopped going to weddings for a few years.  It was nice to take a break, but a lot of people got really mad at me about it.  Which I get, I mean, you're supposed to be there to support your friends and everything, and I always wanted to be there in the abstract sense, but I knew the reality was that I wouldn't even get to spend time with my friends, and I was just another mouth to feed on the buffet line, and I never would have a date, so I would be seated at the "losers" table with all the other square pegs, so I started checking "no" on the RSVP cards. I dunno, I just found the whole thing really personally depressing, especially when after a few years, all those friends who had been in a hurry to cash in all their Bed Bath And Beyond giftcards were now starting to split up and get divorces. 

Allen and I agree, if or when we get married (whenever that might be), we're eloping.  We're not going to ask anybody else to spend money on us.  When we get back, we'll have a great big catered party, and invite everybody we know, and there will be no gifts, just hugs.  We'll probably get some dude with a BBQ smoker to come smoke some BBQ for us, and we will probably have a keg of beer, and we will get drunk and eat some food and not sweat the details.  There will be no bubbles or rice, no four-hundred-dollar dresses, no event location, no rental cars or hotel rooms or formal dinners. There will be paper plates and laughter and plastic cups in the back yard, and hopefully everybody will have a good time without breaking the bank, including us.