Is it common?
Do you think its wrong or weird?
Does too much focus on the wedding take away from deciding on the right person to marry?
This is not really a debate.
I am passing it on to In My Humble Opinion.
I think that anyone who plans a wedding before finding a mate has his/her priorities mixed up. A wedding is just a single day event. A marriage is a long term commitment.
Middlebro had his wedding planned way before he’d found a bride, but the plans started and ended with a big caveat: “if I find a woman crazy enough to marry me and she likes the plan”.
I think his plans were quite reasonable, too, given that the immense majority of our family and of his friends were into mountaineering, nature walks and stuff like that: he wanted to get married on a mountaintop; his preferred choice was Atxerito, aka La Muela (the back tooth), which is a short steep climb on its north side and a long slope with a road from the south. Anybody who felt like it would approach from the north side, those who didn’t would arrive from the south, Mass and picnic at the top, which overlooks a gorgeous landscape. Reckon less than 100 guests.
It ended up being a 300+ people affair in a restaurant specializing in weddings, instead - because that’s what the bride wanted. He abandoned the old plan within minutes of meeting her: he knew he wanted to marry her half an hour after they’d met and she was and is not the mountaintop kind of girl.
Yes, and yes. It’s fucking terrifying. I overheard a girl once on the bus talking to her friend about how she had to get married by the time she’s a certain age (I think it was 24 or 25, something pretty young). She was seriously concerned about this hard deadline she had given herself and fretting over its impending approach. Bitches have agendas, yo.
I know two women who bought stuff for their future grandchildren before their children were pregnant. Talk about pressure.
No, I don’t think it’s weird or wrong. Particularly when you reach the age where your friends and former classmates are getting married, it’s very easy to start wondering what you would do in the same situation. For instance, when my friend chose blue and green for her decorating scheme, I decided that I wanted pink and white. When one friend just had a maid of honor and the other one had bridesmaids, I thought to myself that I’d like to have bridesmaids as well as a maid of honor.
I haven’t actually planned it in the sense of buying a wedding dress or booking a venue, but I do have some ideas running through my head, and I consider that perfectly fine.
-
there’s a big difference between fantasizing and legitimate planning. leafing through bridal mags is different than going out and buying a dress.
-
the age constraint isn’t entirely kooky. GRITS (girls raised in the south) are often socialized to get married by their mid 20’s if not earlier.
3)the issue of “isn’t this an overemphasis on ceremony over love?” is… overestimated. as far as life events go, the wedding is a pretty big deal. moreover, in the current culture - a bride-centric one. lots of girls/women strive for a fairy tale wedding. why wouldn’t they taken an interest in this during their free time?
if there was a custom that before a man could marry he had to climb a mountain, most guys would just go pick out a suitable mountain and hike it. then there are the ones who “go big or go home” and start planning their inevitable conquest of everest before they even meet their future brides.
GROOMZILLA!
A friend of mine who went to a large University in the southern US claimed that it was common for freshman girls to reserve the (somewhat famous?) campus chapel for four years in the future, with the assumption they would be getting married about then. Most of then did not even have a boyfriend at the time. It struck us as rather crazy.
Of course they have to book that far in advance. Look at the waiting list!
Ime, “I have to get married by x” is not a complete statement; it’s shorthand for “I have to get married by x if we’re going to be married (y time) before having (a number) kids (b time) apart and have them out of school before we retire at (z age,)” or “I have to get married by x or my whole family will give me endless shit about being an old maid and start trying to set me up with anything with a penis and a pulse.” You just never hear the second part of the sentence when you overhear this sort of conversation because the person in question is talking to her friends, who are already intimately familiar with the factors going into this deadline and don’t need a refresher course.
I suppose you could call it an agenda, but it’s no better or worse an agenda than a retirement plan. I certainly can’t fault someone for thinking about whether or not they want kids, how soon after marriage they’d want them, how many, what spacing…before you’re actively in a relationship with the other parent of these putative children is really the optimal time to be thinking about that sort of thing. It is, after all, the sort of area where you really want to be sure you’re compatible with each other.
As for the wedding planning, someone actually picking out venues and dresses and invitations is pretty damn rare, pretty weird, and more than a touch creepy. Someone knowing what level of formality they want, who they want for attendants, and that they want to carry their favorite flowers is pretty well standard.
I think how you view marriage is also a factor. For some people finding a lifetime soulmate whom you share a sacred bond, etc., isn’t important for marriage. They see marriage as ideally a friendly business arrangement between families. In fact, the marriage may even be arranged in some cultures. Some people just enjoy planning parties. They believe that they will eventually get married and the wedding is usually the biggest party planning opportunity most people have.
It depends on how detailed the plans are. Having a notion that you’d like pink and white, or that X spot would make a lovely venue - totally not crazy, in my book. And if you’re willing to toss the whole notion with good nature if your eventual partner isn’t on board with it? Fine.
But actually buying stuff, making elaborate scrapbooks, etc. of utterly non-negotiable things would signal to me that this was a very probable Bridezilla who wasn’t interested in giving her someday groom much input into what’s one of the most important days in *his *life if it is in hers. Now, of course, many men would rather not get too involved in the wedding planning anyhow, so it wouldn’t be an issue, but to me it’s the signal it sends. This is a woman who is domineering, controlling and self centered and wants a doormat of a man…and may very well be entirely unconscious of that. That’s a scary person.
I think in the broadest sense there isn’t a woman alive that hasn’t the main details of her wedding worked out. But I’m talking rough generalities like, big vs small wedding number of guests, indoor/outdoor, church vs civil, etc
It’s fun to leaf through bridal magazines. I worked in a hotel and we’d keep bridal magazines and planners in the main sales lobby. Even married woman loved to read them.
If your talking generalities, than no it’s not weird, it’s normal. But if they’re meeting with planners and booking thing then yes it’s a bit off.
I think it’s bizarre. I’m female, raised in the South, and I’d have eloped if the groom hadn’t insisted on a “real” wedding. The marriage is fine, but I hated “my special day”.
Some women just really enjoy fantasizing and mentally planning events like a wedding, while others don’t. I worked in a bridal shop and still didn’t have any concept of what I wanted in a wedding other than “Not that.” When it came time to actually plan a wedding, I was pretty apathetic about it, but that doesn’t mean that the women who have much more detailed ideas and wants are somehow freaks. I mean, they might be, but I don’t think having ideas for a future wedding is evidence.
As others have said, if it’s already planned down to the last detail with a “Just add groom” notice at the bottom, that’s freaky.
I don’t think it’s weird as long as, as has been said above, it’s just fantasizing for fun.
But then I also like to furnish imaginary apartments on IKEA’s website.
I like to plan parties, and I’d given some thought to my wedding before I met my husband.
I think having some ideas about what you’d like is normal. Most people attend a few weddings before they get married, so they have time to consider whether or not big bows on bridesmaid butts are a good idea or if an open bar is really a good plan.
I TOTALLY agree with what I bolded. I have no woman in my life, but DO KNOW who’ll be in my wedding party, what we’ll eat for dinner (chix), and I have a song I like I’d pick as our “1st dance” song (“I’ll Stand By You”-Pretenders).
My planning consisted of “get a JP to officiate”. I was overruled by my mother. I hadn’t planned on a guest list, or anything, I just didn’t want a big fuss.