F*cking handling it: On burning it to the ground
I'm an air sign. I lean heavily toward the belief that that matters, but I do have a small amount of skepticism. Nevertheless, I am primarily an air sign and I think I have been fueling conflagrations my entire life as a result. You are just going to have to pardon my language from here.
I have been planning a wedding. In earnest, lately, as it is 38 days away. I am about to talk some wedding planning shit that you will either find fascinating or you will completely glaze over because, and I cannot stress this enough, this shit doesn't actually fucking matter. I had started having mixed feelings about our venue choice and included coordinator/caterer back in late spring, probably early May. But I talked myself off the ledge, because "I've already called off one wedding in my life, I don't need to fuck myself over and risk that again." And here we are, the me back in early May was fucking right and we should have jumped ship.
Anyway, I took our wedding, then 40 days away, and started to slowly burn it to the ground. I can still turn this thing around and keep the original plans, but until I know for sure, I am gonna watch it smolder. I am almost entirely certain that by the end of tomorrow we will have secured a new venue, with food, and begun the process of officially breaking up with our other one. Man. There is nothing like reaching out to 30+ venues in the course of one afternoon, with the news that you're starting over with no time to spare, to make you feel jitters like your body is made of frightened birds. I am nothing if not highly functional under pressure. Of course I wasted money buying the wrong dress first (I sold it) and keeping a deposit on a place that I had reservations about since spring. I think maybe this is partly my crazy, mixed with the insanity of this industry that caused me to go against my gut so readily- I am typically better at trusting myself. Weddings need to exist, and I'll explain that more in a minute, but they currently really suck at it.
Weddings are a hot fucking mess. The entire industry is a racket, and everyone knows it needs to be fixed, but nothing ever gets done. There will be a brief, weak wave where someone tries to do something reasonably, and the next thing you know they've found a way to raise the tax of whatever new thing they thought of to fit industry standards. It's infuriating- you think of something clever, and there are suddenly 22 roadblocks. And I cannot wrap my head around why this is so fucking difficult, to the point of being comical.
The reason we need things like weddings, is because they have long been a symbol of joy and celebration.* And in case you haven't noticed? People are being pretty horrible to one another and it has been going on forever, but now it's in our faces all the time. The news is bad. (And, millenials are broke. Pay your student loans because money is real and even though the world is maybe dying, you don't wanna default do you? Good lord.) Like, really bad. And yeah there is good in the world, little glints here and there, and that good is gonna rise again probably someday. But the world is mostly, currently, a hot garbage fire on a still July day. As you can see, we really gotta change our expectations as a culture.
(*I know not always, but listen. A vast majority of people think "nice" when they hear wedding and not "gross, child marriage exists", okay? Calm down there, Debbie.)
I have been listening to an inordinate amount of true crime podcasts while I prep for this wedding. And frankly, it has helped me keep a perspective and prevent my staying down for long about anything. Wedding planning is some conspiracy level bullshit, and it is stealing our joy. But let us not dwell on that too long, because we should also be eternally grateful that we are not Lisa Buziak, for example. I'm thinking I could call it "For Better, Or For Worse," because if you don't really mean that shit down in your soul, then you shouldn't even be here.
I have to be getting close to being onto something. I have been feeling this nervous, twitchy sensation of being SO FRICKIN CLOSE to The Thing, without being directly on it. It would be so helpful if I knew what I was looking for. But as I sat at the bar last night, folding cranes, telling a couple acquaintances about my complete change in plans, I kept saying "there has to be a better way to do this." The owner shook his head and the bartender nodded, sympathetically, saying "There has to be a better way." And isn't this how all these good little things in the world start anymore? There has to be a better way.
I have been planning a wedding. In earnest, lately, as it is 38 days away. I am about to talk some wedding planning shit that you will either find fascinating or you will completely glaze over because, and I cannot stress this enough, this shit doesn't actually fucking matter. I had started having mixed feelings about our venue choice and included coordinator/caterer back in late spring, probably early May. But I talked myself off the ledge, because "I've already called off one wedding in my life, I don't need to fuck myself over and risk that again." And here we are, the me back in early May was fucking right and we should have jumped ship.
Anyway, I took our wedding, then 40 days away, and started to slowly burn it to the ground. I can still turn this thing around and keep the original plans, but until I know for sure, I am gonna watch it smolder. I am almost entirely certain that by the end of tomorrow we will have secured a new venue, with food, and begun the process of officially breaking up with our other one. Man. There is nothing like reaching out to 30+ venues in the course of one afternoon, with the news that you're starting over with no time to spare, to make you feel jitters like your body is made of frightened birds. I am nothing if not highly functional under pressure. Of course I wasted money buying the wrong dress first (I sold it) and keeping a deposit on a place that I had reservations about since spring. I think maybe this is partly my crazy, mixed with the insanity of this industry that caused me to go against my gut so readily- I am typically better at trusting myself. Weddings need to exist, and I'll explain that more in a minute, but they currently really suck at it.
Weddings are a hot fucking mess. The entire industry is a racket, and everyone knows it needs to be fixed, but nothing ever gets done. There will be a brief, weak wave where someone tries to do something reasonably, and the next thing you know they've found a way to raise the tax of whatever new thing they thought of to fit industry standards. It's infuriating- you think of something clever, and there are suddenly 22 roadblocks. And I cannot wrap my head around why this is so fucking difficult, to the point of being comical.
The reason we need things like weddings, is because they have long been a symbol of joy and celebration.* And in case you haven't noticed? People are being pretty horrible to one another and it has been going on forever, but now it's in our faces all the time. The news is bad. (And, millenials are broke. Pay your student loans because money is real and even though the world is maybe dying, you don't wanna default do you? Good lord.) Like, really bad. And yeah there is good in the world, little glints here and there, and that good is gonna rise again probably someday. But the world is mostly, currently, a hot garbage fire on a still July day. As you can see, we really gotta change our expectations as a culture.
(*I know not always, but listen. A vast majority of people think "nice" when they hear wedding and not "gross, child marriage exists", okay? Calm down there, Debbie.)
I have been listening to an inordinate amount of true crime podcasts while I prep for this wedding. And frankly, it has helped me keep a perspective and prevent my staying down for long about anything. Wedding planning is some conspiracy level bullshit, and it is stealing our joy. But let us not dwell on that too long, because we should also be eternally grateful that we are not Lisa Buziak, for example. I'm thinking I could call it "For Better, Or For Worse," because if you don't really mean that shit down in your soul, then you shouldn't even be here.
I have to be getting close to being onto something. I have been feeling this nervous, twitchy sensation of being SO FRICKIN CLOSE to The Thing, without being directly on it. It would be so helpful if I knew what I was looking for. But as I sat at the bar last night, folding cranes, telling a couple acquaintances about my complete change in plans, I kept saying "there has to be a better way to do this." The owner shook his head and the bartender nodded, sympathetically, saying "There has to be a better way." And isn't this how all these good little things in the world start anymore? There has to be a better way.