Here comes the bride...?

For the life of me I can't remember where I first heard this, but I just want to get it out there that I recognize that the thoughts for this particular entry didn't come directly from me. It was from a short online comedy routine I saw on a blog somewhere and was amused by. I saw the video some time ago and didn't even think about it again until today. I was watching wedding shows on TV with my mom... probably totally not a "feminist" thing, but I'm over it... and it got me thinking...

What is it with weddings? I get that they're important because our culture has made them important and, yes, even I see them as such. There's so much that just goes into this one day that it almost makes my head spin to think about it and yet, if you watch these shows, you realize that at least 99 times out of 100, it's all on the brides. They're the ones who are fretting over every last detail and crying over every slight bump in the road. The grooms merely stand along the sidelines and chuckle to themselves. "Women are crazy" is what I imagine they're thinking. Heck, while watching these shows I believe even I've thought that more than a handful of times. Seeing these poor ladies running around, losing their cool, and being treated like escaped asylum patients is insane, but their reactions to all of these stressors can be downright ridiculous at times. Is that "victim blaming?" I don't mean to make light of such a topic... victim blaming is a horrible thing... but I mean, I can't think of another way to phrase it. Most of these women are being burdened under centuries of tradition which tell them that this ONE day is all that matters. It is the most important day of their entire lives and if it goes wrong, so help them God, they might as well call it a life. There is no way they will ever get over it. No wonder they're half crazed before the real planning even gets under way! If I thought that my entire life rested on making this one single day absolutely perfect, there's no way I would be able to rest either!

It really hit me how important things like that are, though, when my mom repeatedly turned to me while we were watching these brides and their wedding planners make decisions and asked me if I was getting ideas. A few times I thought she was joking, but then I realized she was serious. At the present time I am not planning a wedding, engaged, or seeing anyone at all. I can't imagine that a wedding is in my immediate future. I know my mom was probably just trying to start conversation, and it's not like I'm sitting here enraged at her in any way. It's not like what she was saying was offensive, but still... there is no wedding anywhere near for me. I am not the kind of person who could plan this far ahead for such a thing. What I like today would be my least favorite thing in the entire world tomorrow. Yet already I'm expected to start thinking about what I want my wedding to look like? Finals are coming up! How am I supposed to see past tomorrow, let alone that far into the future? It just feels like so much pressure is put on girls starting as far back as I can remember. Heck, I'm sure in high school my mom asked me about my wedding and if I had any ideas in mind. I grant that I know people who got married immediately after graduating high school, but I certainly had no intentions of doing that, so why would I need to know what kind of cake I wanted? I just wanted to get my diploma and get out of town! You already want me to be able to tell you what the colors are and whether or not I want my initials in red or robin's egg blue on the edge of a napkin? Jeez...