There's an entire subgenre of human interest stories that involve Weird Weddings. You know, when you tune in on your local news, and they play some footage of the happy couple saying their vows in a hot air balloon/while bungie jumping/naked while the anchors cluck their tongues and laugh at just how weird people can be. Because, you know, they're not doing the normal thing and dressing in big pouffy dresses and tuxedoes and doing that same little high school graduation step down the aisle that no one can ever get quite right.
You know what? Fuck them.
Let us consider, for a moment, what a wedding is for. A wedding doesn't make two people married; that gets done down at the county courthouse. No, a wedding defines a marriage for the community. It says who the couple is, and who they will be as a married couple, to their family and friends.
And my advice is, if you're defining what your marriage is going to be, be honest.
You may mock, but the divorce rate among couples who get married wearing forehead prostheses is shockingly low.Some things to think about if you're planning your wedding:
1) A marriage ceremony is theatre, and you are not the audience.
The wedding ceremony is not for you. It's for the people you invite, so they can see you getting married. The reception is not for you. It's for the people you invite, to thank them for coming.
The honeymoon? That's for you. Get the hell out of the reception as soon as possible and get going.
Trust me: approach the ceremony as theatre, and things will go well. If you can involve someone who does theatre for a living in the planning (clergy are good; actors and directors are best), things will go even better.
If you can do what I did and marry a stage manager? Best of all possible worlds.
2) Theatre isn't about sets or costumes or the biggest venue. It's about creating a truthful, expressive moment.
More is not better. Our wedding was stupid simple and stupid inexpensive, and people have consistently said it was one of the most (if not the most) affecting and beautiful ceremonies they'd ever been to. Of course, we're both theatre folks, so we knew what we were doing, but intention counts for a lot. If you make your wedding about showing how much stuff you've got, well, that's how you're choosing to define your marriage. Good luck with that.
3) Don't spend money. Spend forethought and effort.
See the video above. As another example, my wife and I fought for two days running about our vows. I mean fought. Tearful, wrenching, things-being-thrown arguments. But the vows were important to us, and by god, we got some pretty great ones.
By putting thought and effort into the wedding ceremony, you're putting thought and effort into what you want your marriage to be.
Oh, but ladies? I'm not talking about picking out the flower arrangements. If your guy is into that, more power to him, but if he isn't, don't torture him. You know what you want; don't pretend you want to have an actual discussion about it.
4) Require audience participation.
Before we said our vows, we made everyone except us raise their right hand and promise to support our marriage; to treat us like a married couple from that moment on. It was a wonderful moment... and although I haven't had to remind anyone of that promise yet, I'm glad it's there.
Plus, people love that shit. Especially grandmothers.
By god, if you're going to get married in the rubber Admiral Akbar mask by a Slave Leia...
...then you'd better damn well make grandma wear the stupid plastic Amidala hair.5) Get somebody else to do the grunt work.
A lot of rehearsing for a play is drumming your lines and blocking into your body so that you don't have to think about any of it during performance; so that you're free to play the thing. Part of your planning and forethought should be centered around making sure that you have as little to think about as possible on the day of the ceremony. So that when you say your vows, you can say them with all your being.
That means probably means rehearsing some. But it mostly means getting your hands on someone else to run the ceremony, and then letting them do it.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go watch that video again. That wasn't my wedding, but it sure as hell was theirs, and it gives me joy that they found each other, and that I found mine.
-- The Prolix Wag
I'm never wrong. She's just more right.
I'm never wrong. She's just more right.
OMG! I love the video. Had to close my office door since I was laughing and jumping around so much. Will have to incorporate some type of unique idea into the ceremony next year. Thanks so much for inspriation and good point of view.
ReplyDeleteKim
that video rocks. I hope I have the balls to do something like that.
ReplyDeleteMy wife and I had a kinda normal wedding. But we loved it. Guess were going to be boring. ^_^
ReplyDeleteHey, we did the same thing as you at our wedding - asked everyone to promise to support us when we stumbled.
ReplyDeleteAside from the fact that when we later fell apart, nobody did shit, I thought it was a pretty good idea.
Jack_OatMon: Weddings are kinda like sex: if you loved it and she loved it, you did it right.
ReplyDeleteTBR: If I'da been there, I'da done what I could. Next time around, I've got your back.
I loved our wedding. It was beautiful, traditional enough to make my family happy, and with enough of our weirdness to make us happy. Or at least I thought so. Mine and Jack_OatMon's wedding was boring by comparison to that video, though! But I think it went beautifully, so in then end, that's all that matters. :)
ReplyDelete