wedding idiocy; move on

So in the next year and a half, Jay and I will be going to at least three weddings. The first is my cousin, coming up in June; next is friends of ours in September, and finally, we have my best friend Elizabeth, getting married probably in September of '08, which is possibly the most exciting because I get to be the maid of honor.

I am totally girling out here. Elizabeth came over for dinner on Saturday night, and said that she wasn't sure if it was okay to bring bridal magazines, and I was all like "Dude and WHY WOULDN'T IT BE because we could spend about SIX HOURS going through them and it would be FUN."

It also means politicking time. Jay does not understand why I need a dress for my cousin's wedding ("You have skirts, right?"), why we need to buy them a gift that's between $50 and $100, and why it was important for my name to be on the shower gift my mom bought. I also know that by saying these things, I will get people reading this who think I am nuts to think that these things matter, but oh, they do. You see, I will get married some day, and I want these people to think "Oh, she bought us something nice, we should get her something nice." Sure, they're family or close friends, but for most of them, that thought is there, even if not consciously. Maybe that makes me - or my family, whatever - bad people. Maybe it just makes us realistic. The trick is not to buy something so ostentatious that they feel bad or like you're flaunting your money, but to buy something where they go "Oh that's so nice!"

As for the dress thing, it's just one of those unspoken rules. Sure, I'm a first cousin, so that means I don't have to wear a gown, but I do have to wear a nice dress, probably cocktail length. A skirt and blouse just aren't going to cut it. Thinking back on it, I probably should have worn a dress when we went to Jay's cousin's wedding last September (what the fuck is with the September weddings, people), but since I wasn't related, I could get away with a skirt and blouse. I felt under-dressed though, but that could just be because everyone else did a variation on black, it felt like, and I was in a very nice brown ensemble.

And shoes! I get to buy shoes!

Jay is not going to be happy when I make him buy a suit.

And finally, one other note. You know you're an adult when you're looking through the JCPenney sale catalog that came in the mail, see something, say "Oh, I like that", and mean "That would be really good to wear to work. Oh and look, it's not that expensive either".

Being an adult kind of sucks.