Philosophizing | Offbeat Bride

This is Offbeat Bride's archive of Philosophizing posts.

Sometimes it's just about the big picture stuff. How do you FEEL about your wedding? What does it all MEAN!?

Most Recent Posts About Philosophizing

Photobooth photo by Tom Couture

I am confused.

I am confused by the attitude that surrounds weddings and costs and ideas and things. Maybe that's what makes me offbeat — I have this habit of loving everyone and being insanely optimisic even when it's probably not warranted. I give second chances. I love and trust until given reason not to. Every new person I meet, and can carry at least a five minute conversation, I say is my new best friend. I write a daily blog about something happy that happened to me that day.

My problem lies in all the intense bitchiness that lives in the wedding world. "My wedding is better than yours because of such-and-such" and all of the things that go into such a feeling.

I was reading a blog where a woman commented that she had a courtroom wedding and blames opulent weddings for the high divorce rate.

Then there are the haters on both sides of the world. My wedding (and marriage) are better than yours because I chose to have a BBQ instead of a five course sit down meal. [At Offbeat Bride, we call this "one-lowsmanship" -Eds] My wedding (and marriage) are better than yours because I paid for three party rooms and the ghost of Louis Armstrong to sing our first song.

Can we all just chill the fuck out and be nice to each other for like… five and a half seconds?

Same-sex weddings are still new enough that a lot of people wonder how different they will be compared to a straight wedding. I suspect that some straight people automatically think that all queers are alternative, counter-culture types and in their minds gay wedding = rainbow musical theatre circus. But here's why our gay wedding will be relatively traditional…

Friends, pull up a chair, because we have something we need to talk about today: JUDGEY-NESS. You know what I'm talking about: that smirky, snarky, eye-rolly feeling that comes up. There you are, attending a friend's wedding. Or even more likely, there you are: looking at pictures on the internet. And suddenly, what's that? TUT-TUT, did she REALLY!? Oh my lands, SHE DID. Can you beLIEVE? I would never! It blows my mind that anyone could possibly think this was a good idea. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

We all do it, and it's fine — but every time you get all judgey about someone else, you're missing a chance to learn something valuable about yourself.

Just like many, many, many men/women/unaligned-and-loving-it folks on Offbeat Bride, I've been living with my partner for several years now. We've been dating for four years, moved across the country together — hell, we've even adopted a one-eyed kitten together. Personally, I think this situation is awesome. I can go into my wedding day absolutely sure that this is a man that I'm not only head over heels for, but also a man that I can share a bathroom with without wanting to stab him.

So it's been interesting to find out how many people think that living together pre-marriage seems to somehow make it "less special"…

Wherein a trip down memory lane with her parents' wedding album made this Offbeat Bride re-think her ideas on wedding photography in general.

The venue search has been one of the biggest learning experiences about myself. I just thought that if I kept on searching and searching the most perfect, affordable, and available venue would surface and announce it's presence like a beautiful wedding whale. I didn't want to just pick something out of desperation, but time was running out, people were getting annoyed and, I needed to do something quickly before I went completely nutter-butters.

If you had talked to me a couple of years ago and said things like "backyard wedding" or "potluck dinner," I would have smiled and said that was "lovely… for someone else." Now though? Things are different. I'm a different person in a different relationship with different circumstances.

So, I'm getting married. Like, picked a date. Like, getting magazines delivered monthly to my door, reserving room blocks, and picking out "my colors." And, although the semi-addicted online shopper in me enjoys parts of this exploration, it does become a glitter and bubbles-filled tornado after awhile. And I was spinning out of control.