Saturday, April 21, 2012

Stupid-Girl-Wedding-Obsession Syndrome

  I really think I'm coming down with something. I have been hankering to make a pinboard dedicated to wedding stuff and I'm getting increasingly more annoyed with people my age getting engaged/married. It's happening. I'm becoming one of THOSE girls. You know what I'm talking about.
  After the romantic ideals of my last relationship never happened (a very rude awakening, I might add), I vowed to never become that girl. I vowed to be the smart, ambitious, independent woman who focused on her career, paid all her own bills and got her master's degree before even thinking about anything wedding related. I'm 22 years old, none of that has even nearly been accomplished, yet I'm being suckered into the commercialist romanticized ideas of the wedding industry and all things wedding. This is not good. What is wrong with me?! With the sky-high divorce rate and constant complaints about married life out of the mouths of married people, marriage scares me. Any inkling of having to settle down and give up my freedom makes me sick to my stomach.
  And I don't even like weddings that much. Like, at all. I think they are over-glamorized, materialistic, and start way more drama than they are supposed to. And they're expensive! I will admit though, they do give me a good excuse to make use of some of the dresses I otherwise have no use for, get creative with my hair and dance for a good five or so hours. But the whole reality of awkward forced interaction with people you don't know because you're all stuck together at the miscellaneous misfit table really just turns me off to them. Let's face it, we've all been that person of whom the lucky couple has no real attachment to who's really only there as a warm body to help fill the venue (Or because your groomsmen boyfriend needs a date... that jerk. I'm not bitter.).
  But I'd really like to know what's with the constant preoccupation with them? Girls obsess over their weddings from the time they are born because that's what we're supposed to do, according to fairy tales and society. I don't understand why girls see their wedding day as the be-all, end-all best day of their lives. Like it's some sort of rite of passage into real womanhood, right up there with reaching menarche. They obsess about the details of the wedding and some even yell at everyone within a 2-mile radius, but until the rings have been exchanged, the bouquet has been tossed and wedding night merriment has taken place, they never stop to think about the kind of marriage they're going to have after it's all said and done.
  What gets me even more is that in a woman's life, there will be several "best days" of her life, not just her wedding day. And it varies per woman, too (believe it or not!)! For some, the best days of your life will be the day you bring your children into the world, get to the top of the corporate ladder, or get noticed for an accomplishment that changes the face of humanity. For some the best days of your life will be high school or college (if that's the case, then I feel very sorry for you). And yes, for women who go into it for the right reasons, the day you join lives with the person you want to spend the rest of your life with. But until then, we need to stop occupying ourselves with idealistic romantic notions and the perception that weddings are the key to happiness. Seriously, I'm getting suckered into it at a point in my life where I'm not ready. If it doesn't stop, I'm spending my life savings hiring a doctor to perform a mercy killing.

You all think I'm kidding.