It turns out that I'm not the only one bothered by some of our friends' responses to the wedding invitations. In a way, I find it comforting that my fiance feels the same way I do. It makes me think we have a right to feel slighted by some of the responses. I tend to fly off the handle and have much more intense reactions than my fiance, so the fact that he's on the same page as me makes me realize I feel this way for a reason—and that it's OK to feel hurt because some of our friends won't be at the wedding.
This is the part of the planning that could reduce me to tears if I let it. I could easily start down the woe-is-me path and get lost in a fog of self-pity, but I have to remind myself that a lot of people I really want to see are going to be at the wedding, and it's hard to be sad when I know I'm going to see so many amazing people in one spot in the not-too-distant future. I'm trying to focus on the good and consider it the loss of the people who won't be there.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Declines with Regret
I'd like to think that the term bridezilla does not apply to me. For the most part, it doesn't. I'm not bitching out my wedding planner or screaming at my matron of honor about stupid things like sending me tri-colored swatches when I asked for two-color swatches or using peach-colored gift bags instead of butter-colored gift bags. That's not to say I haven't gotten emotional over some of the planning—but who wouldn't? A wedding is a big deal, and when you spend a lot of time and money on it, there are certain things that just have to turn out the way you expected them to.
Perhaps the most unpredictable part of the wedding is the guest list. We decided who's invited, but we don't decide who actually shows up. The response cards are being mailed to my parents, so my version of eagerly waiting for the mailman and tearing open the little off-white envelopes after he drops the mail in my box is actually me sitting in front of my computer obsessively checking my e-mail between 11 a.m. and noon to see if my mom has sent me an updated spreadsheet with the most recent responses. Luckily for me, their mailman comes early.
The first round of responses brought some obvious favorable replies. My brother and sister-in-law? I'd like to think they'd still come even if they weren't both in the wedding. My mother's best friend and her husband? They'll be there. My fiance's former roommates, the ones with whom we had a huge fight and don't really speak to on a regular basis (and never hang out with)? They're totally coming. They were something like the seventh and eighth people to say yes. Granted, we went to their wedding last summer and one of them is a long-time college friend of my fiance's, but given the fact that we don't socialize with them ever and essentially pretend like they don't exist...well, it's a little surprising that their speedy reply said they're coming.
As surprising as that "yes" response was, there have also been a few surprises with people who declined the invitation. Good friends of ours who live just 20 minutes away and whose destination wedding we attended several years ago will not be coming. One of my fiance's long-time college friends with whom he still keeps in touch has declined. There are others, too, like my fiance's friend and coworker who has been to all of our other friends' weddings and has traveled far and wide to get to them—he's not coming, either. It's difficult to know what their reasons are, but it's far more disturbing to me to have good friends decline our wedding invitation than it is to have people who are/were once acquaintances accept the invitation.
I'm starting to take it personally, too. Did we do something to offend these friends and make them not want to come to our wedding? Is it something about me that they don't like? After all, the friends I've mentioned were my fiance's friends first, so is this their way of saying they disapprove of me? It's probably something bigger than that, but still, I'm curious.
I wonder what their "no" responses mean in the bigger picture. Does this mean we don't have to feel obligated to attend the long-term college friend's wedding? Does it mean we're not as good of friends as we thought we were, and my fiance and I should save our postage during the holidays and skip sending them a Christmas card? Hell, are we even friends if they don't come to our wedding? I can justify being upset about this, although my way of dealing with it up to this point has simply been to say, "Strange," and shrug my shoulders. It's getting to me, though, and I'm starting to think that it's weird that I've been so calm about it. Honestly, I'm getting a little angry, but I don't know if I should be.
I knew not everyone was going to show up to our wedding. For the people we consider good friends, though, I feel like we're being more than gracious when we say we understand that they can't make it. I feel like we're being pushovers, like we're naive people who just shrug off the slight and get on with their lives thinking that nothing has changed.
These negative responses do change things for me, but I haven't told my fiance that. I wonder what he thinks?
Perhaps the most unpredictable part of the wedding is the guest list. We decided who's invited, but we don't decide who actually shows up. The response cards are being mailed to my parents, so my version of eagerly waiting for the mailman and tearing open the little off-white envelopes after he drops the mail in my box is actually me sitting in front of my computer obsessively checking my e-mail between 11 a.m. and noon to see if my mom has sent me an updated spreadsheet with the most recent responses. Luckily for me, their mailman comes early.
The first round of responses brought some obvious favorable replies. My brother and sister-in-law? I'd like to think they'd still come even if they weren't both in the wedding. My mother's best friend and her husband? They'll be there. My fiance's former roommates, the ones with whom we had a huge fight and don't really speak to on a regular basis (and never hang out with)? They're totally coming. They were something like the seventh and eighth people to say yes. Granted, we went to their wedding last summer and one of them is a long-time college friend of my fiance's, but given the fact that we don't socialize with them ever and essentially pretend like they don't exist...well, it's a little surprising that their speedy reply said they're coming.
As surprising as that "yes" response was, there have also been a few surprises with people who declined the invitation. Good friends of ours who live just 20 minutes away and whose destination wedding we attended several years ago will not be coming. One of my fiance's long-time college friends with whom he still keeps in touch has declined. There are others, too, like my fiance's friend and coworker who has been to all of our other friends' weddings and has traveled far and wide to get to them—he's not coming, either. It's difficult to know what their reasons are, but it's far more disturbing to me to have good friends decline our wedding invitation than it is to have people who are/were once acquaintances accept the invitation.
I'm starting to take it personally, too. Did we do something to offend these friends and make them not want to come to our wedding? Is it something about me that they don't like? After all, the friends I've mentioned were my fiance's friends first, so is this their way of saying they disapprove of me? It's probably something bigger than that, but still, I'm curious.
I wonder what their "no" responses mean in the bigger picture. Does this mean we don't have to feel obligated to attend the long-term college friend's wedding? Does it mean we're not as good of friends as we thought we were, and my fiance and I should save our postage during the holidays and skip sending them a Christmas card? Hell, are we even friends if they don't come to our wedding? I can justify being upset about this, although my way of dealing with it up to this point has simply been to say, "Strange," and shrug my shoulders. It's getting to me, though, and I'm starting to think that it's weird that I've been so calm about it. Honestly, I'm getting a little angry, but I don't know if I should be.
I knew not everyone was going to show up to our wedding. For the people we consider good friends, though, I feel like we're being more than gracious when we say we understand that they can't make it. I feel like we're being pushovers, like we're naive people who just shrug off the slight and get on with their lives thinking that nothing has changed.
These negative responses do change things for me, but I haven't told my fiance that. I wonder what he thinks?
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
It'll Come Back to Me
I took a short break from writing, and now I'm ready to get back to it. It feels like coming home after a long vacation. You know the feeling—the cab drops you off at your house, you walk in, it smells a little musty and closed-up, and somehow it's dinnertime but you've been existing in a different time zone and would prefer to go to bed rather than eat something. Nevermind the fact that someone has been cooking all your meals for the past week and the concept of eating at home, which was your routine before you left, now seems completely foreign. Which knife do you use to slice tomatoes? What does the oven need to be preheated to if you want to cook pizza? What's it like to drink a nonalcoholic beverage with a meal? You knew the answers at one time. And at one time, I knew what to write. Now I have to figure it out again.
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