Understanding Bridezilla's Point of View

I heard an interesting theory the other day: a justification for the high cost of wedding services.

As Clyde and I prepare for our September ceremony, I've noticed in my research on invitations to caterers, how much everything costs. And when you put the word "wedding" in front of it, it's twice as expensive or more. It's what I call the over priced and over hyped "Wedding-Industrial Complex."

So the justification for this inflating, this nuptial gouging, from dress makers to cake bakers, is: that brides are especially difficult customers. With the singular goal of having THE perfect wedding, these "bridezillas" are impossible to please. They demand way more time than the average customer, they change orders at the last minute, and they are bitchy. Throw in their mothers, future mothers-in-law, and a couple of "helpful" bridesmaids, those poor vendors have their work cut out for them.

Point taken. And by the way, let's face it, the grooms are usually absent at this stage of the planning, unless there are only grooms in which case ...

So anyway, I am not ready to excuse the excesses of the WIC. I still think it's a huge rip off. I have a co-worker who spent $24,000 (yes, twenty-four thousand dollars) on his wife's engagement ring last year. I asked him why he didn't just buy her a wedding car. He also told me how much they spent on invitations, the wedding venue, the amount of money per guest at the formal sit down dinner, and the honeymoon in Mexico. It was jaw dropping.

He asked how much Clyde and I were spending. When I told him that we bought a kit on Amazon and printed invitations at home for about $25, his jaw hit the floor.

We're trying to spend money wisely. The wedding will be small - just some family and a few very close friends. We won't have a formal dinner, just some nibbles and a cake at the reception.

We're splurging on a few things, of course. We're going to buy new suits - sensible ones that we can use again. Not that I will - I haven't owned a suit in decades.

I can see the points of view of wedding vendors. I wouldn't have the patience to deal with a bridezilla.

I can also sort of relate to the bridezillas. I haven't had a melt down in a bridal shop, yet, but I do want things to go well. Even a simple wedding is stressful. There are lots little things to take care of.

For example, when we first made a list of what we needed to do, we remembered important details like meeting with the priest, planning  a honeymoon, and buying rings, but we didn't remember that we need to get a marriage license, the part that makes this LEGAL. I have no idea how or where to get it. It simply hasn't been part of my experience. I assume we go to the city and county building, but beyond that, I'm pretty clueless. What does it cost? Do we both need to go? How far ahead do we need to do it? And flowers. One of our church friends asked what we planned to do about flowers. Flowers? Huh. What else are we forgetting?

We have some advantages that most brides don't have. We're men for one thing. Unlike many little girls, neither Clyde nor I grew up dreaming of our wedding with a thousand little fantasies to live up to. Perhaps some gay men did, but we didn't. My fantasy growing up was just to have my own apartment and a boyfriend. Done and done. I never imagined I could have a legal, church sanctioned wedding. This is gravy as far as I'm concerned.

Another advantage is that we're older. We have some perspective that young couples may not have. We know things don't always go as planned and we're pretty ok with that. Our priest told us that the important thing to remember is that if she shows up (and she promises she will) and the two of us show up, we'll get married. That's all that really matters.

Caught Between a Dumbass and a "Bitch" - Does it Really Matter?

As often happens, the office chatter around me zeroed in on this year's unusual presidential election. Typical of the national conversation, my coworkers could neither comprehend ignorant dumb ass Donald Trump, nor could they fathom a bitch like Hillary Clinton at the presidential helm.

With earphones stuck to my head and my eyes glued to the monitors, I really tried to stay out of it. No one's mind is ever changed by these conversations, and while most of the others treat the topic as casually as they do a jawing about local sports, I would just get really mad and take it personally if I got involved.

But when one of the senior managers pronounced that in fact, it didn't really matter who was elected because none of our lives would actually change based on the outcome, I just about boiled over.

"That's easy to say if you're a straight, white man who has lived in privilege all his life," I fumed. "You take your wife for granted and you don't have to worry that the next Supreme Court appointment could lead to the invalidation of your legal marriage. You have never had your civil rights threatened by a majority vote of your fellow citizens. You have never been threatened with ejection from your home country just because your parents immigrated without proper papers when you were too young to understand what was happening. You were never denied the right to vote just because you didn't have a current driver's licence..."

... is what I would have said, had I been participating in the conversation.

Just to clarify, I don't think Hillary Clinton is a bitch. That's just what some people I work with think.

I've never understood why so many people hate Hillary Clinton so much. To many, she represents cold, conniving liberalism at its worst. She is seen as a shrill, calculating, and ruthlessly ambitious liar.

Of course, many of these adjectives wouldn't be nearly so uncomplimentary if they were describing a man. Men who are ruthless and ambitious are actually admired. And they are never described as shrill.

I have always really liked Hillary. Ever since her controversial 1992 comments that she wasn't just some cookie baking housewife standing by her man, I've admired her intelligence and chutzpah.

She has always come across to me as warm and hard working, deliberate and thoughtful. So sometimes she's a little awkward when she tries to tell a joke, but hey, do we need a comedian in the White House or a President? Hillary is an effective behind the scenes leader who works well with others to get things done, as demonstrated by her performance in the U.S. Senate. Sure she's outspoken, and her views have evolved. She is tough but has a human side as well, though she is criticized for showing the slightest emotion - the woman can't win, really. She's either too tough or too vulnerable.

For the "family values crowd," she takes marriage more seriously than many Republican counterparts, having never been divorced though it would have been totally justified had she chosen to do so. I love that she's a committed member of the United Methodist Church. Let's see, has Donald Trump been divorced? Is he a church member?

As for her alleged "crimes" - Benghazi, the email scandal, Vince Foster's suicide ... One by one, Clinton has been repeatedly cleared of wrongdoing, or doing nothing outside of what was normally also done by Republican peers. The fact is, Republicans can't find that she's done anything really wrong, so they make stuff up or exaggerate because they can't stand the thought of her coming into power.

And while I'm at it:

I really don't understand why so many people are supporting a Trump presidency. He has consistently and blatantly lied. He has demonstrated tremendous lack of knowledge about general civics (such as how government and elections work). He has openly declared and bragged about his own racism and ignorance regarding the world outside of the U.S. He has brazenly offended entire populations of the world with Mexicans and Muslims leading the way. It totally defies logic that he could be elected - and yet he is going to be the Republican nominee.

Donald would make a terrible President. If he even listened to advisers, they'd have to spend their time teaching him the basics of how law is made and why he can't just do whatever he wants because Congress figures in there somewhere. All constitutional checks and balances would be sent into overdrive just to make sure his whimsical power trips don't upset the fragile nature of our form of government.

At least we are presented with a choice this election season. I remember elections past when people complained that there was really no difference between the candidates.

I'm getting married this summer. To a man. For the first time in my life, this is legal in every U.S. state. It isn't too much of a stretch of the imagination to comprehend that if Donald Trump is elected, he could appoint someone to the Supreme Court who could reverse the decisions that made my legal marriage possible. That would only be the beginning.

The person who ends up being President matters to me, to a lot of people, personally.