the new martyrdom for the middle class

Etiquette Hell, where I am currently reading about the seemingly common form of wildlife known as the Bridezilla.

Okay, even stripping away exaggeration, classism (you can kind of see that coming when the writer uses the words 'prestigious' with 'college' and 'tacky' with 'decorations', at which time I settle in to contemplate how snobbery seems to increase in direct proportion to how much one's husband is making), and what seems to be, in some cases, deeply seated personality disorders....

I give up. Do weddings really drive people crazy? I can do a ninety percent bullshit deduction and still be absolutely terrified of anyone engaged for the rest of my life. I pasted it to adannu (and boy, I wonder if she's speaking to me, we were both reading it as of seven this morning with a sense of disorientation. ), and what actually strikes me the hardest (hence my blankness), is that (almost) everyone writing in is just really, really stupid.

Here is the Generic Bridezilla Victim Profile--

1.) Asked to be part of the wedding, then beaten directly after while the bride yells MY DAY MY DAY MY DAY and then orders everyone to not get pregnant and searches out hideous dresses that could actually make burqas make a big comeback.

However, this is okay. The bride is stressed and OMG IT IS SUCH A HONOR.

2.) Hand tatting the bride's veil while she tries to strangle her directly after hand writing in calligraphy a thousand invitations on home-made paper made from extinct trees the OP chopped down and processed herself OUT OF LOVE.

(If you know what tatting is, you just winced so hard your fingers slid over the keyboard. Because only a masochist would try that. My mother, accomplished in some of the finest handwork I have ever seen and used to sell her extras, tried to break her tatting needle thing. We are lucky we do not own a smelt or something.)

However, this is okay. The bride is tired and OMG IT IS SUCH AN HONOR.

3.) Is not invited to any of the parties/some of the parties/all of the parties but expected to bring many gifts/one expensive gift/money. And is insulted/derided/mutilated with a ritual knife if these demands are not met.

However, this is okay. OMG IT IS SUCH A--really? I--don't know why, really.

4.) Spends thousands of dollars on airfare and hotel rooms, spends a week decorating for entirety of the wedding with handcrafted and professional level decorations without complaint, negotiates between wedding party, family members, and guests like a nuclear winter in the Middle East is on the line, and holds the bride while she cries because one ribbon is one tenth of an inch shorter than it should be. Then the bride drops her from the wedding party because at the weekly bridesmaid weigh-in, she has gained an ounce.

However, this is okay. Did I mention personality disorders?

5.) They go to the morning/afternoon/evening wedding where there is crappy food/minimal snacks/no food/poisoned kool-aid. Everyone stays.

No, really. And help clean up afterward.

OR

5b.) Is literally sent to the kitchen like a re-enactment of Cinderella to act as the entire wedding guest list's personal servant. There may be spitting involved, but oddly, no singing mice or glowing godmothers.

However, this is okay. Does anyone see a pattern?

6.) No one, other than the victim, sees anything wrong with this.

However, this is okay. Fuckall if I can figure this one out.

7.) Victim is accused by friends, family, guests, random passers-by on the streets, and during three separate seances of not being supportive of the bride.

....yeah.

8.) The bride does not send a thank-you note.

NOW SHE HAS GONE TOO FAR.

I'm serious. I--wait. I missed one.

9.) She's still a good friend!/At my wedding, she had better be a better bridesmaid!/She has turned everyone against me and I cut myself at night!/I married much better and she has forty-five kids and is divorced!/MY HUSBAND MAKES MORE MONEY! (there are a startling number of 'we are poor now (no comment) but that is because we are in college of course getting really awesome degrees' bridesmaids; strange.)

*hands*

I really can't even think of a conclusion here.

Comments

[amireal.livejournal.com]

In my capacity of bridesmaid/maid of honor I have prevented brides from killing their mothers, negotiated various pacts among family members, prevented the death of parental figures, crawled under the brides skirt to attack the dress to the undergarments (actually I think there were two of us, it wasn't even that big a skirt), done the brides hair/makeup/decorations, PREVENTED PARENTAL DEATH, talked the bride down, told the bride to take a pill and that I'd be back in 20 minutes, PREVENTED HOMICIDE re: MOTHERS, and offered tissues.

Bridezillas stem from a deep seated need to spend MORE THAN YOUR DOWN PAYMENT ON A HOUSE on a wedding, which is absurd.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

...okay, I have maided twice, for my cousin and sister, and I think the most stress we had was it started raining during the ceremony and my sister, being my sister, ignored with flair until the vowing was done.

[piplover.livejournal.com]

I was still in the Army and just injured when my sister got married. I was her Maid of Honor and let me tell you, she was a bridezilla. I flew in for the wedding and was immediately besieged with decorations and flowers and practice dinner. Then, to top it off, my sister actually told me I was her last choice for Maid of Honor because her first choice was pregnant and her others couldn't make it. 0_o I seriously think something about weddings damages the female brain, and I vow never, ever, ever to let that happen to me. I will take medication, damnit!

Ummm, yeah, sorry, still a sore spot. I think brides are generally evil and should be avoided at all costs.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

*WINCES HARD* I am sorry to give you flashbacks. Ewww. Just--eww.

[mrshamill.livejournal.com]

Do weddings really drive people crazy?

Short answer, yes. Long answer takes longer than my Mucinex-addled brain can formulate, but suffice it to say that we paid for our FUCK YOU MOTHER SIMPLE AND EASY wedding ourselves specifically so that we'd avoid the bridezilla nonsense, skipped the pre-parties, put a FUCKING GORILLA ON TOP OF THE HOMEMADE CARROT CAKE WEDDING CAKE (my best friend, a chef, catered the wedding as a gift to us for just the cost of the food, he made the cake himself and crashed the tiny little biplanes into the homemade cream cheese frosting beneath the gorilla that had a little bridal veil on its head and was clutching a tiny blond groom in one hand and mom refused to eat any of it), told my two bridesmaids to just find simple, fall-colored, knee-length dresses to wear, and I STILL ended up in tears at the rehearsal. Blessings on my Gramma, who knew what I wanted and just stood up at the end and busted the damn 'receiving line' up.

So. Yeah. They do. ::hack::wheeeze::

[amireal.livejournal.com]

This sounds similar to what my sister did, only my mom was totally for it, cheaper to make dinner for 10 people, buy some flowers and decorations and have a wedding at the house than to actually do the traditional stuff with a caterer and stuff.

[ladyholder.livejournal.com]

Eh. When I got married I wasn't all that involved in the whole planning stage thing. My mom & hubby did, mainly because I was overseas & really, really uninterested. Hell, the only reason we had a flavor for the cake was because Hubby made the decision.

Bridesmaids dresses... My sister made that decision. Mainly because I was not going to put her in a dress she hated. I was not that dumb. Really.

Uhm... Mom had a minor meltdown, but it was perfectly understandable and it is still giggled over today. And my sister forgot Hubby's ring in the dressing chamber so Dad had to run out in the middle of the ceremony to fetch it, damn her. Beyond that, the wedding was great, very low-key and everyone had a good time.

So, not all brides are horrid, insane creatures. Some of us are happy to turn up & get married.

~L

[seperis.livejournal.com]

See, I have to believe the vast majority of brides would not survive to the wedding if this was so common.

...I have to believe this.

[joannindiw.livejournal.com]

... *boggles*... Maid of Honor once. I showed up. [the most stressful part was finding a dress. For me. Because apparently, nobody my size should be in a wedding in any capacity. I think the bride suffered more than I did through that.] I had the vague feeling that I was supposed to do something more than show up, with the dress, and not fall over, but the bride didn't give me direction and I had no clue, so. Um. Yeah.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Pretty much that's all I've ever been required to do.

[dameange.livejournal.com]

Yes, weddings do make you crazy. Now add all that crazy to an "I can't stand the guy she's marrying but grin and bear it" situation. Oh yeah, I can't wait for this wedding to either be canceled or over with.

[cyprinella]

I've been a bridesmaid three times. All three were outdoor weddings in Great Lake states and only one of the brides was smart enough to have it in late summer when it was guaranteed to be warm. The others had theirs in late spring and in both I was outside, shivering in polyester. Only one led to mud splattered shoes that I could never wear again, though. In the other, the bride was carefree enough (and wise enough) to let me put on my boots after the ceremony. The fourth wedding I was in, I did one of the readings and it was perfectly pleasant and drama free. And inside.

[cyprinella]

Also, I am highly considering eloping and having a nice catered party after the fact at home. This is actually be contested by my stepfather of all people.

[trishkit.livejournal.com]

Don't know nothing 'bout no weddings..

But tatting!

Both needle and shuttle, baby.

Have you read the Funeral section of EH yet? If you have not yet lost all faith in mankind it will disappear here.

[droolfangrrl.livejournal.com]

Wow. Sounds like the kind of wedding where you want to give them a nice knife set as a present.

http://www.wednet.com/articles/KnivesAsGifts.aspx

driving by, reading fic but...

[thearchpoet.livejournal.com]

Wow. I have to agree with the "just really, really stupid" comment.

I've never personally witnessed a Bridezilla but I have however, been part of a wedding where it was just one HUGE culture clash from the dress to the ceremony on down. I don't know why it didn't occur to the bride and groom to talk possible points of contention over beforehand, (although I got the sense that the bride was trying really hard to please her mother in law,) but they didn't and the result was horrible. In the end, out of 300 guests, over 100 (the bride's side) left less then halfway through the reception because they were offended by how the groom's side of the family celebrated weddings.

[vito-excalibur.livejournal.com]

Etiquette Hell taught me that the word "classy" means exactly the opposite of whatever the speaker/writer means it to mean.

[brownbetty]

It seems to be one of those qualities that you only assert the presence of of when it is in doubt, like sobriety and truthfulness.

[norabombay.livejournal.com]

This makes me glad that I will follow the traditions of my people: Eloping.

Or DIY weddings.

My parents got married in my Grandma's back yard. Between the ceremony and the party, Dad went fishing, Mom went swimming.

The only advice? Pay somebody else to do the food- a BBQ or something. My Grandma did all the cooking and had a total meltdown.

I can live with that expectation.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

*grins* Brilliant.

[eal.livejournal.com]

Maid of honor three times. The second was the most bridezilla-like. Three showers to which I had to bring presents. Insane bridesmaid dresses which my mother made. Still referred to as the Frederick's of Hollywood dresses (dark purple with black lace overlay). Bachelorette party which I had to plan.

And to top it off, I had to convince my father to take communion because he was the only Catholic on her side of the church.

Great times.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Oh my. *sends sympathies, wide eyed*

[synecdochic]

I am frequently pressed into service for weddings (mostly because many of my friends are not religious and therefore have no church to get married in, and I can marry people legally in all 50 states) and I have learned the following things:

1. Bring tissues. (Oddly, it is usually the groom who needs them.)

2. Bring bottled water. No, really.

3. There will always be a last-minute nailpolish crisis. (Sarah's sister was flash-drying her last-second manicure touchup in a bowl of ice water while the processional was starting.)

4. No matter what the bride says, smile and agree, and then go solve the problem your way.

5. Performing the wedding means that you are exempt from wearing bridesmaid dresses. This is the best possible thing that could happen.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

...I am tempted to ask if you decided to go into doing the services to avoid the dresses. Because if you did, I will state now, after reading that website and this journal entry? You. Are. Brilliant.

3. There will always be a last-minute nailpolish crisis. (Sarah's sister was flash-drying her last-second manicure touchup in a bowl of ice water while the processional was starting.)

That is so bizarrely true about every single special event. It's the one time I can feel deeply superior for biting my nails.

[esther-a.livejournal.com]

Luckily, none of the weddings that I've been involved with have involved that kind of insane drama. My cousin had a lovely wedding, held at her parents house, planned on two weeks notice, (the groom was shipping out for overseas military duty). Of course, the weddings in question didn't involve people who are invested in big showy events as status symbols either. I suspect that if you can avoid that attitude, it's probably going to be much easier on everyone's nerves.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

I'm thinking it helps, yeah. My sister's was about that quick and simple, too.

Thank you for letting me rant, still angry after 18 years!

[teenygozer.livejournal.com]

When I got married, I was very nice about it. Reasonable. Sane.

My mother, however, had been tasked with the insane Bridezilla behavior of my sister two years earlier and had sworn she wouldn't go through that a second time, so she was terribly alert for any instance where I might be trying to push her around. Every time I ventured an opinion on anything, she'd react by verbally body-slamming me to the pavement, "We're doing this MY way, or your father and I aren't paying for the wedding!" After a couple of months of that nonsense, I finally took her out to the back porch and explained in calm tones that the next time she threatened not to pay for the wedding, ComicbookMan and I were going to elope and there wouldn't be a wedding to pay for.

She was okay after that until the night before the wedding when she hysterically ordered me to go downstairs to tidy up our finished basement "just in case we entertain visitors down there after the wedding." My maid of honor did her job and got me out of there before I killed the mother of the bride. So Momzilla went downstairs to tidy up and saw a big, ugly box next to where my gown was hung and wrestled the box under a table with a long tablecloth on it, hiding it from view. There, much better!

Except that was the box containing 150 little boxes of expensive hand-dipped chocolates with our names on them that was supposed to be by placed everyone's plate at the reception that I'd put next to my gown so I would not forget it. And I forgot it. *sigh*

So I'd say weddings bring out the crazy, but it's not always the bride whose crazy is brought out.

Re: Thank you for letting me rant, still angry after 18 years!

[seperis.livejournal.com]

*winces hard* Ooh yeah. *winces more*

[littlemousling]

Huh, Etiquette Hell is new to me so I clicked over and my first story selection was this one, which sounds like my idea wedding (well, I'd probably have music, but on an iPod or something). Luckily the EH person gives the complainer what-for.

[littlemousling]

*ideal

[pirl.livejournal.com]

My bff is getting married this summer and she (so far) has validated brides-to-be. She doesn't want a shower because they already have so much stuff. she's getting a dress made from a local seamstress at half the cost of the taffeta shit you'd find in a big-box store. She's concerned that people will feel obligated to or embarrassed that they can't spend money on them so she's planning on setting up a donation website so people can anonymously give money to their tip fund (since they're not registering anywhere). No showers, no bridesmaids save for her sister, and a bachelorette party planned a couple days before the wedding so people won't have to fly in twice. Seriously, she rocks my world. ;)

But yeah, most of those brides need to be put down.

[wyomingnot.livejournal.com]

I've never been a bridesmaid. Been married three times, only had one bridesmaid myself total. The sum total of her responsibilities? Show up with a dress. She brought three and let me choose. :)

I was content to have a civil ceremony at the courthouse, but my mom wanted more. I told her that was just fine... but I wasn't planning it. It was all hers. Thankfully she and dad, while not broke, were not able to afford anything at all fancy. :)

Three weddings. I've never worn a wedding gown. Second wedding I wore sandals (fake birks, no less).

I don't get all the fuss for weddings.

[notpoetry.livejournal.com]

Oh, god, I've been the bridesmaid to two friends so far (neither of whom had ANY BUSINESS getting married -- seriously, we were kids, one bride was NINETEEN, the other was twenty-two), and one of them was a thrown-together wedding because the bride's mother and groom's mother were both desperate for them to get married before the bride's unplanned pregnancy started to show. I pretty much just showed up to the park on the appointed day and time, wearing "something pretty, just, please, no visible stains or tears." The wedding itself was remarkably low-key, for all the drama that relationship and those families were fraught with.

The other friend's wedding was considerably more difficult -- it was a lesbian marriage, and she was the decidedly more laid-back partner. Her wife-to-be made all the plans, and I quietly went along with them even when they seemed antithetical to what my friend wanted. My friend didn't speak up to ask for what she wanted, even when the rest of us bridesmaids told her what her fiancee was planning. And then, of course, they had a giant fight in front of all the bridesmaids the night before the wedding. Good times!

I am never, ever getting married.

[seekergeek.livejournal.com]

Oh, god, FLASHBACKS. The one time I was a bridesmaid, the bride was a bridezilla. I really should have seen it coming. I mean really, anybody that would bust out in tears because I hadn't marinated the chicken before cooking it when I invited her over for dinner is obviously a drama queen. But no, I was oblivious to her not-so-hidden crazy and said yes when she asked me to be a bridesmaid.

Big mistake. It was her third (THIRD, PEOPLE!) wedding and she expected all the bells and whistles of a first wedding. One woman from her church volunteered to have a small bridal party for her. This woman then calls me up in a swivet because bridezilla had invited every woman in the world that she knew the name of, including people I knew for a fact hated her with the passion of a thousand suns. I had to talk the poor woman down and then told her that most of the women listed wouldn't come and to stick to her guns and insist on only a small party. I didn't go to that party. I didn't want to go to that party because I could well envision bridezilla pouting the entire time because she didn't get what she wanted.

Bridezilla also insisted on a 16th century costume wedding (which I didn't actually have a problem with) and also insisted on sewing ALL THE COSTUMES. *facepalm* To top it off, she kept insisting that I'd wear my dress afterwards at some historical functions that we both went to. THAT DRESS WAS SO FULL OF FUG THAT I BURNED IT INSTEAD. Her opinion of her sewing skills far outstripped her actual ability. I definitely would have done better if only she had let me (which I begged her to do by the way, but she was determined to be a micromanager).

I didn't take her out for a bachelorette party because of work, and she whined about that even though I warned her in advance that I was not going to do it and that she needed to find some other sucker person who could do it. She panicked for the entire week before the wedding and wept on my shoulder constantly about the stupidest stuff.

I cooked her dinner to ease some of the strain she was under and once again she denigrated my cooking because I didn't cook spaghetti exactly the same way she did. (SPAGHETTI, PEOPLE. SHE HAD A HISSY FIT OVER SPAGHETTI.) By the time the wedding day came, I was ready to KILL HER. On the wedding day she continued to spaz and freak out and be a drama queen on me and I basically crawled up inside my head and went catatonic to get away from it all. I barely remember anything at all of the wedding or picture taking afterwards because of that. After the interminable picture taking was over, I stripped off the fugly costume, found my husband and begged to be taken home because there was no way I was staying one second longer in that woman's presence. I have not spoken another word to her since then.

Yeah. Flashbacks. *shudder* Sorry about that.

When I got married, I told my friends that if they tried to have any parties for me that I would kneecap them with a tire iron. I then holed myself up in my sewing room and sewed my own wedding dress for the next several months. I was the most antisocial bride, EVER. My sole direction to my bridesmaid was, "The color is rose. You know what to do." She came in a lovely and flattering knee-length rose-colored dress which she was then able to wear at two other weddings she'd been invited to. I think my sole bridezilla moment was when my sewing machine broke while I was gathering up eighty gazillion yards of lace. I blubbered over the machine for a while, went out for a walk, came back and then was able to fix the problem, all without subjecting another human being to my crazy.

You know, there's something positive to be said for being antisocial.

[out-there.livejournal.com]

Conclusion: I'm suddenly insanely gald that I've never had to attend a wedding. (No, literally, only one I've attended was my parents second marriage at age 4 and a bit. I've never been to a wedding as an adult, and suddenly: SO WONDERFULLY PLEASED by that.)

Also: passive-aggressive friends are NOT your friend. Honestly, girls, grow a backbone and tell the bride to shove it if she's this hard to deal with.

[deadlychameleon.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the one weird wedding thing I went to was where I had a semi-melt down at the bachelorette party and wanted to go home (couldn't, had carpooled), because I'd have rather been with the groom and guys at their party instead of with a bunch of girls getting faced that I didn't really know. Oh well. That was totally my fault.

[sholio]

I am so damn glad that I managed to avoid that bullshit. My husband and I threw a barbecue in the park that happened to include a wedding ceremony in the middle (officiated by my mother, which is legal in AK), and the only real expenses were the cost of picnic food for 30 or so people, and a pretty cake with fruit on it. Also, I attended the bachelor party, which consisted entirely of my future husband, his father and underage brother (and me) having some drinks at a local bar.

I'm not gonna tell anyone how to run *their* wedding, of course -- hey, if your daydream is to spend the cost of a new car on getting hitched in a gorgeous ceremony with a Greek chorus of 300 matching bridesmaids, more power to you. That's awesome and I hope it goes off smoothly. I really can't tell you how much I didn't want a Cinderella dream wedding, though. (Plus, by that point, I'd been having sex with the groom for five years, so I hardly saw the point in showing up in virginal white. *g*)

[niqaeli]

Yeah, no, there actually is something about weddings that tends to make brides go crazy no matter how very sane the bride herself may be. The fact that you are basically organising a social event complete with catering and other such logistical nightmares actually is a lot of it. And that usually there are a lot of people with Strong Opinions on How It Should Be Done.

The only time I ended up really stressed and in tears was when my mother and I absolutely fucking failed to communicate about the registry (or rather the lack thereof) and our very strong stated preference for money over gifts -- really, we needed a new roof and, you know, you can't really just buy us one shingle, and we couched it in pretty much those exact terms. She and I got into a flaming row over it. It had a lot to do with the generation gap, I think, and my mother's pride and her refusal to ever ask for help or money.

But the process of organising that many things is hard and I managed only with a lot of help and by dint of having my parents not actually care so I had free rein. And our wedding was only about 50-60 guests. I don't know how people even manage to have 100 people or more.