This is how I wanted to run our donation drive. Meg said no.
But seriously. This week has been AMAZING. When Meg proposed the idea, she was a little wary of even doing it in the first place. And then when our first post went live, I think Team Practical sat around their respective computers and held their breath, waiting for upset comments and emails.
And they never came.
You readers have been so supportive. SO supportive, above and beyond what we thought would happen. Meg didn’t read any of the guest posts ahead of time so they were like a gift to her, but Lauren and I had our own gifts – the comments. So many lovely comments and inspiring comments and honest comments and funny comments… And some of the lurkers came out to talk about how APW has helped them! (We see you now. You better not go back into hiding…)
Comments like this:
I’m a queer grad student in a serious relationship. I’ve been lurking for a month or two now, and I sent you guys a donation because I love your attitude towards marriage. I hope my as-yet-hypothetical wedding and marriage is as practical and meaningful as the ones you all write about.
Yesterday, in a dentist’s office, I started flipping through a bridal magazine. I was reminded how disgusted I am by the wedding-industrial-complex. Every single page in that magazine was about Things: gowns, invitations, shoes, rings, hairpieces, favors, honeymoons in exotic locales, tubes of mascara. The shoe page included one $950 monstrosity covered in … well, at that price, I don’t know if the sparkly things were rhinestones or actual diamonds! Never once did the magazine talk about love, or commitment, or the hard work of creating and supporting new and old families. No, the weddings in this magazine were designed as ostentatious displays of wealth and fashion. The magazine never talked about the moment when the honeymoons ended, the credit card bills had to be paid, and the newlyweds had time to establish their lives.
Without APW, I might have noticed how massively that magazine missed the point of marriage, but I wouldn’t have known there was a community out fighting for the kind of wedding and the kind of marriage I’d someday like to have.
Thank you. –Rymenhild
This is so true. I’m not married and probably don’t intend to be, though I’m in a long term committed relationship that looks a lot like a marriage. I use APW as a sounding board, about what it means to be a woman in a committed relationship, and also to explore what my views of marriage are, why I don’t like the idea for me (please note for me, not for you) and whether I can ever imagine liking it for me, and if not why not. In short I think its amazing that so many women here are reclaiming what it means to be married, and wives, and even if that doesn’t suit me its damn useful for me to know why it doesn’t suit me.
It was a lot easier for me to be clearer to myself about why I didn’t want to get married, or have a wedding, or be called wife, before there were so many smart, liberal, caring, powerful and educated women saying I didn’t have to do it THAT way. And that self questioning is so helpful. Its why I come back to APW time and time again. – Frances
I just donated!
Even though my husband and I both work full-time and are barely paying our bills, I opted to make my lunch instead of eating out today, and donate $5 to A Practical Wedding.
I did it because I realized today that, out of nowhere, I have become a creative, confident, strong person. I’m not sure when it happened, and when I stopped being afraid and submissive, but it happened. And it happened in part because of the wonderful, wonderful women on this website. Thanks to all of you, and here’s hoping my $5 helps fund something amazing! – Erin
I actually found APW early on in my wedding planning and my wedding is still 3 months away. I’ve always enjoyed the graduate posts and imagine what I might have to say after my wedding. And I recently started going through the archives… It was phenomenally helpful to see Meg didn’t start so… enlightened! At first, the posts are more irritated, confused, and questioning. And that was great for me to see… as I’m in that stage right now! I have no idea if I’ll continue reading after the wedding but when I get to caught up in wedding planning and start having a nervous breakdown over the envelope liner color or some other ridiculous detail, I quit all wedding blogs and read only APW for awhile and it usually brings me down to reality! – Alice
Every day on APW this week has been like a big hug. A giant, massive, running-leap hug that we return to you all.
NOW. Here is where we might have had an Ask Team Practical question, but nah-uh, not this week. Because this week we have something special.
A big part of this drive was to help fund “Reclaiming Wife” as its own site. That is off in the not-so-distant future, but we are SO almost there.
BUT, in the meantime, we will be having a few more “Reclaiming Wife” posts. Posts that focus on the questions that you guys have requested. The big issues and the little issues and all those funky ones in-between that you go, ‘I SHOULD know how to deal with this, but I really really don’t.”
And who is going to write those posts, I hear you ask.
Meg? Nope, the addition of Team Practical and this drive was an attempt to take more off her plate, lest the site suffer in quality.
Lauren? Though she is a smart smart cookie, she’s not a wife yet.
Alyssa? Nah. I got this cushy gig on Fridays. Besides, can you guys really handle that many run-on sentences and gratuitous ellipses?
So WHO?
You.
Yup. We are recruiting our wives on APW to do posts and discuss some of the great questions the community is clamoring for. It’s not a matter of answering the issues at hand – hell, if you can answer them, we need to get you on the road and with a book deal. But we’re asking that you guys give some clarity and advice if you’ve dealt with any of these issues. The strength of APW is that the best content is not only in the post, but in the comments. The reader contribution is just as strong as the writers’ and we want posts to facilitate those conversations. The post is not the answer or the end, it’s an extension of the question and definitely only the beginning.
And as usual, we want to definitely hear the gay and transgendered sides of this issues. Scratch that, we NEED to hear the gay and transgendered sides of these issues!!
Issues like:
- How has life changed for you post-wedding?
- How do people outside your family treat you after marriage?
- Holidays. How do you share with your family? Do you start your own? What about traditions?
- How do you assert independence as a couple?
- How has your wedding fed your marriage?
- What about marriage after a long-term stable relationship? Does that relationship change? Was it worth it?
- Where our older, married couples at? (Sarah K’s mom, I’m looking at you…)
- How do you deal with gender roles in your marriage?
- How do you establish boundaries within your family?
- For our same-sex couples who have been married legally, has your marriage changed your relationship?
- What about seasons in marriage? Falling out of love and falling back in. In what ways do you deal with that?
- How do you have your partner’s health in your marriage? Serious medical issues as well as typical everyday issues.
- Marriage haterz who spout the doom and gloom of married life. Fact? Fiction? What do we do?
- Fighting, arguing, not speaking to each other. How do you fight fair?
- Dealing with betrayal in marriage. How do you come back when the trust is broken?
- Oh, in-law’s. Do I even need to say anymore? But we want both sides, the bad AND the good.
- People who’ve dealt with career changes, we want to hear from you! Did it affect your married life in more than the expected ways?
- Cross-cultural and multi-national married people. All you lovely diverse wedding grads. How have you incorporated your differences in your marriage?
- We’ve had wedding while dealing with loss, but we’d love to hear how people have dealt with those while married.
- Compromise in a marriage. Be it with your household, career, family. What do you do?
So fire up your keyboards and get to typin’! If you want to send in a response, or pitch another topic, send them to reclaimingwife [at] apracticalwedding [dot] com.
The amount of contribution on APW is SO strong, so let’s have some more! Lots, lots more of a good thing sometimes is just lots, lots more of a good thing.
And since you’ve all been so awesome, I give you baby animals**. (Meg said it was okay.)
**All couretsy of Cute Overload. Be careful there, it’ll cute your face off.
