Why People Elope (A cynical view)
For a ceremony that is based purely on two people who love each other becoming one in the eyes of society, the government and god; when planning a wedding it is anything but that.
Wedding planners may be the most under appreciated people that I can think of at this moment. Maybe I am just biased by taking on the role of wedding planner for my own wedding. Believe me it may seem simple, but when you hopefully only have one go at this whole marriage thing, trying to make everything turn out perfectly right is hard. I still think that planning would be a lot simpler if I didn't have a full-time job or if I had thousands of dollars just lying around waiting to be spent on a celebration that will last about six hours. I feel like I am on one of those "My Sweet 16" shows that they sometimes play on MTV (instead of the music videos of course) where rich kids get their parents to spend millions on them for one day that they will forget the very next day when they ask why they didn't get a car in each color. *dreams of being rich pop in my head as Gwen Stefani tries to sing a Fiddler on the Roof song and fails miserably*
For all the planning that has been done already, I feel encredibly worse for the wear, empty for the cause.... like it is all not worth it. Just thinking about the thousands of dollars sunk into this small venture makes me think of all the things I am missing out on. In economics they like to call it the opportunity costs of planning a wedding. So, instead of doing something useful with the money (not that a wedding isn't a worthy thing to do), I will be using it to gather together people half of whom don't know me, the other half of whom would are just coming for the cake. I know I am being overly cynical here, but when I think of eloping to Las Vegas with my maid of honor and Josh with a best man and maybe a few close family members who actually want to see us get married and how much money that would save (even with buying EVERYONE'S plane ticket) it gets to be overwhelming.
Everyone always tells me to remember the gifts that you will be getting, but then I think that anything in the price range that people normally spend on wedding gifts, I already have, or if I don't have it... feel like it is not the right type of gift to ask for as a wedding present like lots of CDs that I have yet to buy for myself, maybe a couple DVDs I like and haven't gotten the chance to pick up, maybe some new clothes or books, but yeah nothing that seems right to ask for a wedding gift.
Despite all that I am genuinely excited for everything that will be coming in the next few months leading to the "BIG DAY" and the years of happiness that will follow.
By the way it is my birthday today.