My day job, and really my life at times, seems to revolve around weddings.
I actively contribute to the Wedding Industrial Complex. It's literally my job, because I sell advertising to wedding vendors. I'm morally opposed to it, and even a little morally opposed to marriage in some contexts. The trade-off is that I get by-lines in the stories I write about weddings, and I get to be in charge of a section in the newspaper and a lil' yearly magazine. It's amazing experience for me. Weddings disgust me and enthrall me at the same time. Their existence turns my head around. Mostly, weddings just bother me. This morning I found some great blogs written by cool women that make me feel very un-alone in my dilemma:
http://apracticalwedding.com/
http://hitchdied.wordpress.com/
http://2000dollarwedding.com/
i'm not a fan of weddings either. it horrifies me how much money some people spend on their weddings, not to mention all that time and effort planning them, and all the wasted resources. that said, i think i probably will get married eventually, because i'm not completely anti-marriage...my partner and i have discussed throwing a small outdoor gathering with our best friends and family, with a non-religious exchange of vows, and he would be wearing a traditional wedding dress while i wear some kind of crazy outfit possibly involving a tuxedo shirt. it would also be a vegan potluck, we'd get one of our friends certified online so they can be our officiant, i would sew our dresses and decorations, and ideally we would not spend more than $100 or so on the whole thing. more like a party celebrating love and happiness than an actual wedding.
ReplyDeleteOh, Emily, that sounds amazing. And that kind of gathering is often found on those blog links I posted. Yesterday I read something about a Quaker self-uniting ceremony, that is, with no officiant. I don't know how much the Quaker beliefs play into that, but the general idea sounded really appealing to me.
ReplyDeleteooh, i like the sound of that too--i didn't know you could be your own officiant.
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