Advice

May 2012

The last time Cephas and I were in Malaysia together, my mom took us to see the wedding venue we'd booked after extended discussions about the inadvisability of holding the wedding dinner at a house in the jungle.

(Among the various benefits of a venue in the midst of luxuriant tropical jungle, there was a drawback: the place had no kitchen facilities, not even a microwave.

"What if the food gets cold?" said my mom.

The venue coordinator tried her best to be helpful: "Oh, don't worry. So long as the guests are hungry enough, they'll still eat even if it's cold.")

We'd settled on a rather more practical option that satisfied both my parents' desire for a certain amount of poshness, and our desire for somewhere unstuffy where our guests could relax and hang out. That is, a country club that offered horse riding facilities (sadly, not included in the wedding package), with some greenery, interesting architecture, a koi pond—and crucially, multiple kitchens on site.

The venue coordinator was a polite man in his thirties named Syamsuddin. He listened with immovable solemnity to my mom's description of the theme of the wedding, taking notes on a clipboard. He was attentive but not enthusiastic: he seemed to be nursing a secret sorrow.

"My daughter wants to have a nyonya-themed wedding," said my mother. "You know Peranakan? My mother is nyonya, so we want to reflect that in the style. Maybe match the flowers—I was thinking bird of paradise, tie with pandan. Nowadays everybody wants their wedding to be unique, you know?"

Syamsuddin nodded in understanding. "People feel boring with the normal way," he said. "Next month I have a wedding out there in the gardens. 200 guests. We're putting the chairs out there, an arch for the ceremony. I ask my client what back-up plan they want if it rains, they say it won't rain. Continue reading Zen: Defending Joy

Posted in: Planning, Planning: Journeys, Wedding Undergraduates | 19 Comments »

May 2012

Why Moving in Together is Not Like Test-Driving a Car

This morning, Liz discussed how for some of us, moving in together is easy. Now, Emily is here to talk about how for others of us, moving in together can be damn hard. And you know what, no matter what camp you fall in (or maybe you fall in both camps on different days) you're doing just fine. I also love that these posts explore moving in together both before and after marriage (because yes, both are totally valid options). Let's do it.

“So how is living together going?!” My cousin is standing over the stove, working on dinner with beautiful photos of her recent wedding over her head. I’m sitting at the table, thankful that her back is turned to me, staring down at the napkin I’m twisting ever tighter in my lap.

“Okay.” I say tersely. I’m going for nonchalant, but I’m clearly unable to remove the anxiety from my voice. I’m definitely surprised when she starts laughing at me.

“Sounds about right.” She says sagely with a grin.

C and I met on a crowded metro platform at rush hour, and I was in love with him by the time I stepped off the train. We’d been dating for a year and a half when our leases simultaneously came up for renewal. We’d been living together for about three months as I sat with my cousin in her kitchen. I was losing my mind. Just the sound of C’s voice from the basement where he was playing video games with my cousin’s husband was setting my teeth on edge and prickling the hairs on my arms.

I was totally against living together before becoming engaged. I just wasn’t willing to put myself out there like that, especially when I was so sure about C. His desire to live together first made me feel like he wasn’t sure about me. Like he wanted to test-drive me, and I did not want to go back to the dealer, dammit. But I accommodated him, telling myself that the children of ugly divorces deserve a little extra patience. I’m so glad I did. Continue reading Why Moving in Together is Not Like Test-Driving a Car

Posted in: The Hard Stuff, Wedding Undergraduates | 55 Comments »

May 2012

Wedding Undergraduate: Something Like Zen

Well. You didn't really think we were going to get through this week without a wedding planning post about Staying, did you? Of course not. This post by Sarah is about that classic APW topic of somehow finding Wedding Zen, of finally being able to stay in the moment through, well, struggle. It made me go reread Alyssa's classic Wedding Graduate post (now in the APW book), and my post on my own cake hunt and planning realizations. Because other than the part about not planning her wedding since she was six (um, I started planning mine at four), this post could have been written from inside my head. In fact, reading it, I felt the ghost of past-planning-Meg sitting on my shoulder. All of it sounded so familiar: stressing about not stressing, not wanting to include people who you feel won't hold true to your vision, and then caving and letting people lift you up.

This, wedding undergraduates, is my confession: it is so insidiously easy to overplan your wedding.

I haven't been planning my wedding since I was six. Until I got engaged last August, I never spent a lot of time looking at bouquets and favors in craft stores. I made concentrated efforts in school—which I am impressed with, in retrospect, because it was insight I had no clue I would ever need—to enjoy my time with friends and not worry about dating, and especially not worry about marriages or babies or any of the Big Changes I was nowhere close to ready to experience. I am definitely the last person you'd expect to be anxiously going through page after page of monogrammed anything six months before the wedding.

Several friends and my brother have gotten married in the past couple years, and the more I gleaned from their processes, the more I sort of mocked the whole wedding industrial complex. My bright, crafty pals shared with me the triumphs of venues and the bummers of sticker price, so I thought by the time my wedding process began, I was prepped. I thought that armed with the reflected glow of their nuptials, I could do the whole thing. By myself. On the super-cheap. With zero stress. And it would still look chic as hell.

Well, as you can guess, this combination of options is awesome but didn't happen. One of my friends told me I would stress, stress, stress about the details and so I became determined to not stress about anything. This started a chain reaction of becoming very defensive about all of my decisions. I blocked out my friends, my mom—everyone but my fiancé, and he has been so genuinely calm about the whole thing that he wants whatever I like the best.

My very-soon-to-become-my-husband Joe is a very laid-back character when it comes to most things. He gets intense about his work and he listens to me fiercely when I have something on my mind, but generally speaking he takes things as they come. He doesn't have to-do lists or concerns about how to spend an afternoon, and there is definitely zero fuss about what he is going to wear to any specific occasion. He even has a large Latin tattoo on his leg that means, "It is what it is." I'm much more, "It is what I think it should be maybe today but you know we'll check back on it and hopefully it will get better." That phrase doesn't fit quite as elegantly on the ankle. Continue reading Wedding Undergraduate: Something Like Zen

Posted in: Planning, Planning, The Day Itself, Wedding Undergraduates | 34 Comments »

May 2012

On Not Moving Out

As you know, this week we're exploring the idea of Staying. Making life as it is work. Embracing exactly what you've got. And there may be no better illustration of staying than this post by Dagny about deciding not to move out of a multi-generational living situation after the wedding. Because we talk a lot on APW about how you don't need All The Things for the wedding. But the truth is, you don't need All The Things for the marriage either. That doesn't mean that we need to all become perfect ethical non-consumers (heck no). It just means that we can stop listening to the cultural narrative about what we Have To Have, and figure out what we Really Need, instead.

Last week I was in the fabric store, a bolt of burlap unfolding in front of me with a thud, when the dreaded subject arose.

It started off innocently enough. “What are you making?” the kind woman behind the counter asked, as I know she's required to do. Thud, thud, thud went the fabric bolt on the table.

“Table runners, for my wedding.” And I hope this will be the end of it.

Nearby my eccentric father is wandering around, head bent to smart phone. True to his character, he manages to make a scene by walking behind the cutting counter, an act which makes both socially-anxious me and the obviously confused fabric store employee uncomfortable. I chide him. “It's not so bad,” says the employee kindly, possibly fearing a bridezilla meltdown. “Earlier, a woman charged through here with her shopping cart and knocked everything over!”

“Yeah, you don't have to LIVE with it, though.” I reply jokingly.

The woman smiles. “Just think, you'll be outta there after the wedding!” she replies naively.

Thud, thud, thud, goes my socially-anxious heart. She is wrong. But I won't say anything about it until we're back in the car. Continue reading On Not Moving Out

Posted in: Planning, Wedding Undergraduates | 94 Comments »

May 2012

Zen: The Dress Rules

I made a lot of rules for myself about The Dress, because I loooove dresses and I was a little afraid of what I might do when unleashed in a world of lace and tulle. They weren't rules with any rational basis; they were just rules based on the fact that part of me still guiltily believes that an intelligent human being has no business being interested in what she wears.

Rule: I would not spend anything close to $1,500 on my wedding dress, because that would be silly. (Note: No rational basis, since I can afford it, and hey, fashion is art. If Damien Hirst's preserved corpses can command large sums of money there's no reason Oscar de la Renta's lace dresses shouldn't.)

Rule: I must not have to wear Spanx in order to look good in the dress.

Rule: The dress must be slightly different, but not so much as to cause unfavourable comment. However I must also feel like myself and not just some generic bride when wearing it.

Rule: I wouldn't buy more than one dress. I'd just choose one for the English wedding and stick with it. (For the Chinese wedding it's usual for brides of my socio-economic background to wear more than one dress in the course of the day.)

My search for the Dress started well. I went dutifully to one bridal salon, out of a vague concern that I'd be sorry to have missed the experience of twirling in pretty dresses before admiring friends. To my relief, I found that wedding dresses are just like other dresses—one feels exactly like one's ordinary self in them. I'd worried that it would be a Say Yes to the Dress kind of transcendental experience in which I'd be convinced to part with huge wads of cash because the dresses made me feel so pretty, but this didn't happen. Continue reading Zen: The Dress Rules

Posted in: Planning, Planning: Journeys, Wedding Undergraduates | 33 Comments »

Apr 2012

Relationship Vo-Tech

This week, we wanted to explore the concept of Staying. Staying as in not moving, not making a big change, keeping things more or less as they are. We live in a culture that's pushing us to always make a big change, to always move forward, and do the next big thing. And the truth is, that's not always possible (or even advisable). And in this particular economy, we can't always move on to grand things. Sometimes the next step is a tiny one: It's learning to be happy with what we have, or making one small change. So it seemed perfect to start this week with a topic that has come up over and over on APW: waiting for the engagement. And in this post, M. has decided that she's fine with what she has. No ultimatums, no waiting—just being together and being happy. And it turns out, this post about non-engagement might be the most important post on engagement that we've ever run.

I'm not planning a wedding. Not even close.

Two years ago, a few months after my boyfriend Bo and I started dating, we went to a wedding together. It was the kind of wedding where, along with all the bride and groom's invited guests, their whole church congregation was asked to come, and the reception was just champagne and cake in the church basement. It was beautiful, and we loved how inclusive it was, but we both said that if either of us had a wedding, it wouldn't be like that. (Good—I thought—even though he says he doesn't think he'll ever get married, he's thinking about it. It's only a matter of time.)

Then, that fall, another wedding—this time for friends of mine from college. A very beautiful, traditional Jewish wedding—one where the bride and groom couldn't stop grinning out of sheer happiness. We shared their joy, but again, we said, were either of us to get married, it would be different. (Well, he's still saying "If I ever have a wedding," not "If we ever have a wedding," but if he's got opinions, that's got to be good, right?)

Last summer, we went to the wedding of one of Bo's cousins, and it was flashy, pink, and ostentatious. (There were professional fireworks! it was held in a place called "The Palace"!) We laughed and laughed—it fit his cousin perfectly—but there would never be any fireworks for us!

And by then I had realized that there really weren't going to be any wedding fireworks for us. Because we'd probably never get married.

Continue reading Relationship Vo-Tech

Posted in: Engagements & Proposals, The Hard Stuff, Wedding Undergraduates | 83 Comments »