For Worse

(July 27, 2000)

Just before I drift into sleep, in that vague cerebral gloaming when my consciousness is barely hanging on, I frequently creep myself out. On the hazy edge of slumber, I draw the most peculiar conclusions. Thoughts for which, since I'm not a diagnosed schizophrenic, I must claim responsibility. Thoughts that are also so implausible that they wait for near-unconsciousness to pop out and yell "surprise!" Thoughts that would never survive in full light of day. Like trolls, or bacteria.

Thoughts like, "If I don't make any new friends, I'll never have to endure another wedding."

Apparently content that I've discovered A Great Truth, I fall asleep and dream of tidal waves until the cat wakes me for breakfast by stomping on my ribcage.

Hub and I have entertained the thought of marriage. He gave me a ring in 1994, a family heirloom. It's exquisite platinum and white gold with seven diamonds and a filigree design, and it couldn't be more perfect for me.

Then came 1995. We did four weddings that year, a doozy of a year now referred to as Nupti-Hell (pronounced "nuptial"). Four full-on formal affairs of varying grandiosity and travel time, the closest of which was only three hours away. That one was also distinctive due to having fewer obnoxious guests-that-we've-never-seen-before-and-will-never-see-again. The obnoxious guests were all people Hub and I known in high school. (Keep in mind that we avoided our ten year reunion).

After the last wedding of 1995, late on a snowy December night as I limped on black velvet heels through the icy parking lot of some stuffy function hall, clutching the hem of my $200 green taffeta bridesmaid's dress to keep it off the slushy ground, I looked at Hub, exhausted, in his stiff grey suit, paisley tie long since shoved into the breast pocket�our eyes met lovingly�he opened the car door for me. I murmured, "Darling?"

"Mmm?" He answered. "We are never doing this to our friends," I said. He said, "Damn straight."

That year Hub was in one of the weddings, I was in one, and for the other two we were "just" guests. We were spared the extra joy of renting pants, making payments on horrendous gowns, fittings, accoutrements, trekking across state lines to "rehearse" in a drafty church and fidget uncomfortably while the bride fights with her mother, her mother's husband, her father, and her father's wife. We dressed up, we brought kitchen appliances in satin wrapping paper, we ate chicken cordon blech; we drank watery Midori Sours, we ate carrot cake, we did the dollar dance; we endured the Macarena, the Electric Slide; we did the Chicken dance, we did the hokey-fuckin-pokey until we puked. We smiled into the table-shot, we murmured encouraging and congratulatory words into the video camera. We made small talk with idiotic strangers who kept clinking flatware against glassware; we were ridiculed into joining the "singles" throng to catch the bouquet/garter; we clapped and yelled, "Yay" to welcome for the first time Mr. And Mrs. What-the-fuck-Ever.

There's only one thing that can happen after such a year�and oh how it happened: We hate weddings. We loathe them. We abhor, detest, and cringe at the mere thought of the ceremony, the vows, the white dress, all of it. When I'm angry at Hub, I yell, "You�you�BRIDAL REGISTRY!" If Hub gets cut off in traffic, he roars, "Get off the road, REHEARSAL DINNER!

We were, however, cheered by the fact that after NuptiHell, there was almost no one LEFT in our circle of friends to GET married. We counted up the Potentials. We were stoked. We had what, maybe two or three more to go? Last year we did two, they weren't so bad-- one was actually fun! And one of the brides was a lifelong friend who understands this aversion I have, however neurotic it may be, and was compassionate enough to opt me out of bridesmaidhood. So now we're done, right? Ohhhhh, but so wrong. The invitations, they just keep coming...the weddings, oh god, the WEDDINGS!

If I don't make any new friends�