Collateral Damage

Who wants to get married? I do! I want a nice ring, a cute man, good food, lots of laughter and no wedding. You read correctly, no wedding. I hate weddings. They are one of the few banes of my existence and I detest them with a fiery hot passion.

Why do I hate weddings? Well for starters I feel like they’re a pompous show of whatever wealth you can scrounge up (or the parents shell out). I also hate being the center of attention and having loads and loads of people stare at me. I also hate the idea of having to pick out a “maid of honour”- so many hurt feelings happen that way.

I just looked up on Cost of Wedding.com what it would cost to have a wedding in my zip (postal) code and here’s what they had to say:

On average, couples that live in zip code 220xx (xxx, VA) spend $48,100 for their wedding. Understanding average wedding cost now can help you with your wedding budget later.

Can you believe that?! I don’t even make that much in a year much less in enough time to have a wedding in say the next 5 years. Good Lord! Then of course there’s the ring. According to this site the average cost of an engagement ring in the US is between $3,500 & $4,000 USD. Some girls expect their men to pay that much; in fact they’d be insulted if he didn’t. Me? I found some really nice rings on YesStyle.com where the typical price is under $1,000 USD. They’re really unique and come in tiny sizes for my little, bony fingers.
Let’s not forget the dress! A lot of women go to David’s Bridal to find a nice but cheap dress from around $400 to about $2,000 USD. Not bad. But most women seem to want to get something super nice they can tell everyone about. Oh! I got something designer from blah blah no one really cares! Guess how much money I wasted! According to this site a designer wedding dress from someone like Vera Wang can cost anywhere from $2,000 to $6,000. Why on Earth would you want to pay that much for something you’re only going to wear once? Even if you get divorced (according to the latest statistics taken in 2002, the divorce rate is at about 10% in the US) it’s not like you’re going to use the same dress if you ever get married again. What a faux pas!
Some people like to argue that it’s a “special time” and you want the memories. The memories of what? Stress over making sure everything is perfect? The stress over things like ring size adjustments, flower arrangements, outfit coordination between the groom’s men and bride’s maids? The rehearsals? The photographer? And how is any of this even remotely romantic? Without even looking up statistics, I believe it is safe for me to assume that many couples live together and are already having sex by the time they’re married (actually, the site I sited about the divorce rate also said that the percentage of people in man- woman relationships living together but not married was over 80%). To me romance is suddenly realising that you can’t live another day of your life without your partner in it. Wanting to spend the rest of your life with this person and deciding then and there to get married. My dream would be to elope. Now that’s romance. Spontaneity at its best. Not having everyone staring at you (how I hate that- the very idea makes me feel slightly nauseous and nervous), crying, ooing and aahing, making a mess by throwing whatever crap some random little girl has in a basket everywhere… someone please tell me how any of this is romance.

If I were to have a wedding you can bet there were wouldn’t be many people there. I would rather save the money that’s spent on a wedding for an amazing celebration after. Lots of food, good music, dancing, et cetera. To me what’s important is not spending money and getting nice things; it’s being with the person I love and filled with excitement at getting to spend the rest of my life (hopefully!) with them. To me, that is romance. That is love.

Baroque on AOL Radio.