Marriage Manners
Cam is amazingly well-organized. She sees the colours and ideas in her mind's eye so easily, so the design for the invitations and other things is going smoothly. It's been a lot of fun for both of us so far, though I have to give her the majority of the credit for her hard work.
All of this is a frequent topic when I speak to people, as everyone often asks about our plans and the final date and everything. Therein lies the rub. People don't seem to have any qualms about placing me in awkward situations during conversations. Allow me to point a few annoyances...
1. No, you may not invite yourself to the wedding ceremony, the wedding reception or the engagement parties.
2. If you are invited to the wedding or the engagement parties, then please don't ask someone else if they're invited to the wedding. Well, you can ask that question but don't ask it right in front of me! That forces me into the position of blatantly saying the person is not invited.
3. Don't assume you know who the Best Man is, or the Master of Ceremonies, or the Maid of Honour, or whatever. It may or may not be the person you are thinking of, and just throwing that question out in front of me can be a tad weird.
4. My fiance and I currently go to different churches. However, I made the mistake of answering someone's questions honestly, indicating that I would not want to be in a separate church from my own fiance forever. Lo and behold, two minutes later everyone knew that I was considering leaving my current church. Ouch!
(For the record, I am leaving my current church of Glad Tidings Assembly at the end of the Christmas season in order to join Northpark Community Church. And yes, I have informed my pastor about this already. I've been an active member for three and a half years so it will be somewhat sad to leave.)
Granted, some of these issues could have been resolved if I was more private about the planning. And I have had to speak to some casual friends to clearly ask them to back off a bit and not assume an invitation. I would find it all to be amusing if I wasn't so embarrassed by such situations.
And most of all, I think it's funny that I'm complaining about poor manners when in fact I tend to be oblivious to just how rude I can be sometimes. Irony noted.
17 comments:
All good points.
Another important fact to probably point out is that quite simply, if you are not invited to a particular wedding this does NOT mean that the bride/groom do not like you. In fact, if you are wondering whether or not you are invited to a particular wedding, chances are very good (if not guaranteed) that the bride and groom DO like you, very much.
What is often forgotten is that the bride/groom have large circles of friends - some of whom you probably don't know about. And although you might have a small family, the bride and groom might be inviting a much larger group of family members.
Weddings cost lots and lots of money - and it's generally counted in thousands, not hundreds. Furthermore, the bride/groom are often also trying to do things like find a place to live, furnish said place to live, throw wedding parties, purchase automobiles, etc., etc., etc. And this often adds up. Throw in a particular budget for a wedding and the knowledge that adding every single person to a wedding costs money...
I feel your pain.
Am I invited to your wedding?
Sorry ... I had too :)
LOL!! That is so funny. I am going through some of the exact same issues at the moment. I pretty much expected these things to happen, I just love that someone else can relate.
Just because you haven't been invited is not a true indicator of the bond you share with the bride and groom. There is always a limit to every guest list and it is extremely hard to choose who will be on that list.
Jamie, I hope you don't run into too much more wedding drama (although I'm sure it's expected, lol!). Cheers and enjoy the rest of your engagement, it doesn't last forever ;o).
Are they asking you how many kids you want have too? I know it can be stressful to answer questions from curious people.
I'm in a situation now where my partner lost his job, and everywhere I go people ask what we're going to do. I don't know if they are being polite by aknowledging the situation, or nosy. I so badly want to tell people off sometimes, because it is stressful.
I am happy for you both, and wish you well.
Cheers,
Amanda J.
haha, you'll just laugh all the more harder, i guess, when it's all over, and you can sit back and watch everyone else's discomfort with their own planning.
good luck with it all, and hope it really is a day of all your dreams come true. :)
Gotta say, I'm guilty of opening my big mouth at least once if not more when I should just shut up and for that I genuinely apologize....I'll be more concious of what I say, where, and how I say it...On that note...I'm impressed at your willingness to admit that you have a tendency to lose your sensitivity chip sometimes...That takes guts
After all, I've discovered recently that God has a way of working things out for the good in the end, despite the many bumps that inevitably arise at a time like this. The best times in life often follow the biggest bumps. I have this theory that the human heart only grows by stretching itself over said bumps...Make sense??
I love you and Cam both and I'm thrilled to just be able to see this happen for you... You really do deserve this and the countless other blessings that I know God has in store....
Did you miss my rambling non-sensical comments???
What's your take on wedding crashers? I have friends that frequently aren't invited to weddings, but don't want to miss out on a great night out. They usually show up around 9pm, after the dinner is over, enough to put in an appearance, wish the couple their best and cut some rug. And they bring a card/gift too. And no, they don't scope out all the single guys (like the guys did in the movie).
Cheers,
Amanda J.
Ah, it's so funny to see which blog posts generate the most responses. Glad y'all identify with me. Does that mean I can expect a lot of google hits form now on from other anguished engaged couples? Heh.
Ashleigh, I really like that bit about our hearts being stretched by the bumps in life, and the good eventually comes afterwards...nice 'n' positive.
As for wedding crashers...those sound like the most polite wedding crashes I've ever heard of, Amanda. If they were casual friends that just couldn't fit the guest list, that might even be nice. However, if they're people that I didn't want to see at the wedding for whatever reason, then I would be ticked...or something like that. I say that without any experience at all, though.
When my husband and I got married we had wanted to head down to the court house and find a justice of the peace to do the deed. We found out however that it has always been optional for them to do and therefore ... apparently nobody does it anymore.
We started planning a bigger wedding but wanted to have it done in three weeks so it got quite stressful. We changed our minds and invited six people to the officiants house ... it was great. I must say however, it has been extremely awkward since, when people 'crack jokes' about not being invited to the wedding. Fortunately I have one of two excuses that usually works well ... my best friend wasn't even invited ... or my dad's funeral was the week before so we wanted something intimate.
I do suspect that you will get the same sort of 'jokes' or 'polite hints' even after it is all said and done ... so beware ... because it does not end here.
Jamie...I feel your pain.
I have only one thing to say-
Can I be your flower-girl???? Shaving of the legs is not out of the question?
Just kidding. I hadn't heard about the move yet...From one who has done it, tis a bit difficult but you go where GOD is leading! If people doen't get it...too frikin bad!
I wish you and Cam all the happiness that God has for you, and I'll await my flowergirl status update.
Peace
JP
Jamie, I guess if you have so many people assuming that they'll be invited to your wedding, it's another indication of how many people simply appreciate your friendship. You give of yourself so often to so many people in various ways, it makes sense to me that they value the friendship -perhaps more than you do. I'm well aware of the situation. I think it's just a natural response to the giftings you have.
lol. Now you have to put attach a price to each friendship. Grace to you!!
PS. I happen to highly support the idea of wedding crashers as Amanda J described them. Being someone who always assumes that other people have the best of feelings towards me, I have on more than one occasion shown up at wedding ceremonies uninvited with a card and money. Who could refuse best wishes and money from someone not-even-close-enough-to-make-the-invite-list cut? At least that's the way I see it. ;)
Andrea
For the record, JP's request to be our flower girl has been officially denied. *shudder*
Re: Wedding Crashers
Amanda referenced crashing the reception later in the evening, Andrea referenced crashing the ceremony itself. I, for one, am not so keen on the latter. In our case, there will limited seating as it is and a few unexpected guests would definitely be cumbersome.
Plus, how many people would directly tell a wedding crasher to leave, especially if they're a friend? Hard to judge rudeness after already imposing on somebody.
One of my friends pointed out that a lot of people want to attend weddings even though they may rarely hang out with that friend anymore.
My friend's rule of thumb: If you haven't hung out with the person in the past year, it's better to assume you're not invited and be pleasantly surprised if you are. And that means hanging out casually at parties or whatnot 'cause seeing each other at church doesn't count as personal social time. Make sense?
It's much more rude to invite yourself or make it uncomfortable for the bride/groom than it is for the bride/groom to look you in the eye and say "You're not invited, and you're not coming."
Unfortunately, I think you only really understand this when you ARE the bride or groom.
It's obvious that different people consider different things rude. And I suppose that a wedding ettiquete can be established by the bride/groom/family for any given wedding. Just as Jamie is doing now.
However, never having had my own wedding, I passionately don't agree with the last comment that "you only really understand this when you ARE the bride or groom". No way. It depends on each person and they don't just change the day of the wedding. And we each know ourselves. I would be more than delighted to have anyone show up, in the way that I have, where expense and space are not an issue, provided that they are not disturbing anything. I think that wedding lists are usually limited by space and budget, not by hard feelings towards not-that-close-anymore friends. My ettiquete rules dictate that it is not appropriate for the uninvited guest to monopolize any more than 2 minutes of the bride or groom's time on the day of their wedding because obviously they have many (more important) guests to greet.
So feel free to crash my wedding if you know my name (and you come with a card and 100$), but as I become aware of the feelings of friends of mine who are planning a wedding, I can make my own actions on their wedding day match their definitions of wedding ettiquete, cause that's only right.
I think the assumption of the majority people is that all weddings are by invitation only and wedding crashing is quite rude. Hence the term, yes?
If the particular bride and groom prefer to allow all friends to attend, they can specify that certain portions of the day are open-invitation. Like, the ceremony may be open or the dance portion at the end may be open.
See the comments for the follow-up post: http://jagrant.blogspot.com/2007/11/wedding-crashers.html
So the onus is on the bride and groom to make open invitations, rather than the preferred etiquette of the guests.
As another perspective, I've heard of some weddings that became catastrophes because each of the mothers-in-law thought that the bride and groom should have done something different. Each mother-in-law thought that the kids were outrageously rude about some trivial matter and screaming matches broke out.
Examples: To serve alchohol or not? To invite extended family and cousins? To have a dance? To conform to cultural wedding traditions, like an old-school Italian wedding vs. a modern Canadian wedding? Some of these things are highly contentious.
The point is that everyone in the world has a different perspective on wedding etiquette, as Andrea said so aptly. And that being the case, everyone should allow the bride and groom to set the wedding on their own terms.
If we assume our own preferences, like the idea of wedding crashing, we are saying that our choice is more important than the choice of the bride and groom. That's just asking for trouble somewhere along the way...
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