The Art (or Lack Thereof) of Growing Up
A high school friend of mine is getting married this weekend. We weren't particularly close in school and even less so in recent years when she went up North for college, but she is part of my group of friends who gathers every Thanksgiving for the annual dinner we started almost ten years ago, so we've kept in touch over the years.
She's not the first of my high school cohorts to get married, but she is the first in our group to take the plunge. We're all very happy and excited for her. At the same time, there's also this underlying sense of "Holy crap, one of us is getting married. When did we get so old?" amongst us.
In the novel I read recently, One Day (great book, BTW, if not fantastically depressing), the protagonist describes four waves of wedding invitations. The first wave is the early 20s weddings, where ceremonies are self-consciously wacky in a let's-pretend parody of a wedding. Wave Two is the mid 20s weddings that still have that tongue-in-cheek, homemade quality where receptions take place in community centers and parents' gardens. The third (and most relentless) wave is the devastating mass of spectacular, big-production weddings. The fourth wave of Second Marriages is the one still off in the distance.
According to this description, my friends and I are firmly entrenched in the second wave, the stage where people are getting married for the sake of everlasting love and all that, and not just because they're too young to know better or because they have a surprise bun in the oven.
Side note: I call the first wave of weddings the Facebook Marriages because everyone in your graduating class finds out about the sudden wedding through the pictures that are uploaded onto Facebook approximately 5 minutes after the ceremony. Then, everyone closely follows the bride's profile pictures for the next few months to confirm the theory that she's already pregnant.
Anyway, it's strange to know that we're now old enough to make decisions that will shape the rest of our lives. There have been many times in the last few years, especially during those rare occasions when we manage to wrangle in an out-of-state friend, when my friends and I stop and ask ourselves, "How did we get here? Didn't we just start high school?" I wish I had some poignant, insightful words about growing up and moving on, but try as I might, I can't wrap my mind around the idea of being an adult, much less reflect on how it feels to leave adolescence. I'm mostly just left in a perpetual state of incredulity that I'm a heartbeat away from my mid 20s.
On a related note, my former BFF to whom I haven't spoken in a year and the subject of this saga will also be at the wedding. God help me, I have no idea what's going to happen there. As it is, I'm the last of my friends who hasn't had any contact with her. Most of them are on the slow path to rebuilding something of a friendship, albeit a cautious one. I'm on my own on this one, leaving me to look like I'm the bitch who took crazy pills.
That said, I'm still going to be civil at the wedding. I'll smile and say hello like I would to anyone, but I won't initiate anything, nor will I try to start something. A wedding is neither the time nor the place. Yes, I'm stubborn as hell and the first to admit that I hold damn strong grudges. All I know is that it's going to be rough to see a best friend for the first time in a year and not automatically revert to, well, acting like best friends who didn't have their relationship torn apart.
Sigh. Enough dramatics. Here's some pretty: the cute dress I'm wearing to the wedding. I <3 ModCloth.com. So many pretty, pretty (and expensive-ish) retro outfits there.
She's not the first of my high school cohorts to get married, but she is the first in our group to take the plunge. We're all very happy and excited for her. At the same time, there's also this underlying sense of "Holy crap, one of us is getting married. When did we get so old?" amongst us.
In the novel I read recently, One Day (great book, BTW, if not fantastically depressing), the protagonist describes four waves of wedding invitations. The first wave is the early 20s weddings, where ceremonies are self-consciously wacky in a let's-pretend parody of a wedding. Wave Two is the mid 20s weddings that still have that tongue-in-cheek, homemade quality where receptions take place in community centers and parents' gardens. The third (and most relentless) wave is the devastating mass of spectacular, big-production weddings. The fourth wave of Second Marriages is the one still off in the distance.
According to this description, my friends and I are firmly entrenched in the second wave, the stage where people are getting married for the sake of everlasting love and all that, and not just because they're too young to know better or because they have a surprise bun in the oven.
Side note: I call the first wave of weddings the Facebook Marriages because everyone in your graduating class finds out about the sudden wedding through the pictures that are uploaded onto Facebook approximately 5 minutes after the ceremony. Then, everyone closely follows the bride's profile pictures for the next few months to confirm the theory that she's already pregnant.
Anyway, it's strange to know that we're now old enough to make decisions that will shape the rest of our lives. There have been many times in the last few years, especially during those rare occasions when we manage to wrangle in an out-of-state friend, when my friends and I stop and ask ourselves, "How did we get here? Didn't we just start high school?" I wish I had some poignant, insightful words about growing up and moving on, but try as I might, I can't wrap my mind around the idea of being an adult, much less reflect on how it feels to leave adolescence. I'm mostly just left in a perpetual state of incredulity that I'm a heartbeat away from my mid 20s.
On a related note, my former BFF to whom I haven't spoken in a year and the subject of this saga will also be at the wedding. God help me, I have no idea what's going to happen there. As it is, I'm the last of my friends who hasn't had any contact with her. Most of them are on the slow path to rebuilding something of a friendship, albeit a cautious one. I'm on my own on this one, leaving me to look like I'm the bitch who took crazy pills.
That said, I'm still going to be civil at the wedding. I'll smile and say hello like I would to anyone, but I won't initiate anything, nor will I try to start something. A wedding is neither the time nor the place. Yes, I'm stubborn as hell and the first to admit that I hold damn strong grudges. All I know is that it's going to be rough to see a best friend for the first time in a year and not automatically revert to, well, acting like best friends who didn't have their relationship torn apart.
Sigh. Enough dramatics. Here's some pretty: the cute dress I'm wearing to the wedding. I <3 ModCloth.com. So many pretty, pretty (and expensive-ish) retro outfits there.