On Weddings

Recently I had the chance to attend a pleasant wedding as a guest with no responsibilities (which, strange as it would sound, has not been common for me). It was on the beach, with a beautiful bridal gown and bridesmaids gowns made by the bride's sister, a dashing groom, and about fifty people (including myself) happy to be there and share in the joy. I have long pondered the issue of weddings (and marriage), and would like to comment on some of my ruminations, as June is a traditional month for weddings. I have pondered the organization of this note for some time, though I think it would be useful to organize the thoughts according to the specific questions that I have pondered.

Question #1: What do weddings really mean?

For me, weddings are the triumph of hope and optimism over the gloomy cynicism of statistics and bad personal experience. Being a somewhat gloomy person frequently lacking in hope and optimism, it is perhaps unsurprising that I have never been to a wedding of my own. Nonetheless, I think even for me, if the opportunity was right, I too could see myself saying 'I do' with all the romantic sincerity I have seen many times before. Since nearly 50% of all marriages end in divorce, and since so few people walk down the aisle expecting to fail, it is important to understand as best as possible what expectations we put into marriage, and where things go wrong.

It would seem, from my personal experience, that women tend to be vastly more concerned with weddings than men are. From childhood, or at least adolescence, I have seen young women collect clippings of dresses, collect information on venues to hold weddings, visualize the cake they want, or other details. Sometimes it seems that the last detail to be decided upon is the identity of the groom. Among men I have not noticed the same degree of wedding planning, though weddings are as serious a matter for men as they are for women, and often unrecognized to boot. A woman is a princess on her wedding day (more on that in a bit), but when a man marries, he is making a conscious decision that his days of thinking and acting for himself alone are done, and that he is ready and willing to cherish and provide for (as best as he is able) his wife, and support a family. It is a choice to act with others in mind over a long span of time, even unborn generations to come, rather than simply living selfishly for today. I think men are insufficiently appreciated for the magnitude of the choice they make when they take a woman in marriage.

It would be beyond the scope of a note to deal with the subject of marriage as a whole, but weddings themselves are grand and romantic ceremonies that are the beginning of the day-to-day work of living with someone else who may have annoying habits of behavior that slipped unnoticed through dating. Weddings are to marriages what graduation from high school (or college) is to the working world. We celebrate and cheer, and then realize the task ahead is not quite what we imagined it to be. Any time we step into the unknown we will find things to be different, and more tiresome, than we expected them to be. Our bravery in taking those steps should be matched with the determination to, so far as it depends on ourselves, see the journey through until death. I recognize this isn't always possible, but that is the goal, after all.

Question #2: Why is a bride so beautiful on her wedding day?

There are a few occasions where a young woman looks particularly stunning: prom night, a debutante ball (for those young women who come from high class backgounds), and a wedding. What all of thse events have in common is that a young woman looks like and is supposed to be treated like a princess, and such treatment always seems to bring out the beauty in a young lady. Additionally, especially in a wedding, a young woman feels (or should feel) loved to know that a dashing prince is making a covenant before God to love her and cherish her as long as they both shall live. If that doesn't give someone a glow of happiness, I don't know what can be done.

Why is it that dressing and being treated like a princess makes a young woman so beautiful? Is it because she is dressed in shiny clothing (inside joke)? I'm not sure. Perhaps being treated like a princess and being cherished is one of those nearly universal ways that young women recognize that others see how special they are. Dressing up certainly doesn't make me feel that special, but I suspect that the wedding vows often capture a truth in how husbands and wives feel loved. A husband promises to cherish his wife, to treat her with love and affection, and I suspect many wives feel unhappy when they do not feel cherished by their husbands, but rather neglected instead. Likewise, a wife promises to honor and obey her husband, unless she is so froward as to remove that important promise from the vow. A man feels confident when he is respected and honored, and tends to be unhappy when he feels his wife disrespects him and dishonors him. A wife who is not cherished will probably not honor, and a husband who is not honored and respected will probably not cherish. From such treachery springs disaster. While it may not be possible to always look like a princess or be thought of as a dashing prince, we should at least do what we can to make sure that we appreciate others and help them to feel loved. It's not always easy, but it's worth it.

Question #3: How do I see weddings as a single man?

In my short life, so far, I have participated in a variety of (usually behind-the-scenes) roles. I have occasionally been merely a guest to the wedding, but more often I have had some responsibility. The first wedding I remember attending was the wedding of my uncle J.F. and aunt Cheryl, where I was the assistant photographer, whose job was to pass film to another uncle of mine. My brother got to be the ringbearer, while I ended up in exactly 0 wedding photos. This early misjudgment of ideal wedding jobs seemed to prophesy my future wedding roles rather well, unfortunately. I have served as an usher of a wedding, helped in setting up a few wedding halls, and once even translated for a wedding at the Feast of Tabernacles in Argentina, which may have been my most invisible role, hiding in a corner with a giant set of earphones speaking into a microphone. Only once have I served as a groomsman, and that was during the ceremony for my mother and stepfather, which was almost the smallest wedding I have ever taken part in. It has been my experience that second weddings tend to be much less formal than first weddings.

As an unmarried person at a wedding I always feel a bit out of place. As weddings are an entrance into marriage, I feel somewhat outside of the experience, an observer but not really a full participant. I can (and do) give my fond wishes for smooth sailing and a happy journey, but I have no wisdom to provide on how to help the new bride and groom enjoy a happy and fruitful marriage. I can only be on the outside looking in. As this is not an unusual state in my life, it is something I am experienced in dealing with, but that doesn't make it any less unsettling. It is a bit alienating to celebrate an institution which one is not a part of, nor has any visible prospects of being a part of anytime soon. It would be less unsettling if one could find a variety of unattached young ladies to dance with (for, as Henry Tilney said to Catherine Morland in Bath in Northanger Abbey, a dance is a little like a marriage*), but that is often not the case.

However, one cannot go to a wedding, particularly where one knows the bride and the groom, and thinks highly of both, where one does not wish them all the happiness in the world. I can only think of one wedding I have attended, and I was an usher in that one, where I had reservations about the marriage based on the drama that had taken place in the relationship. Unfortunately, that marriage quickly ended in divorce. Even someone like myself, who is often pessimistic, can enjoy a wedding and feel the hope that is all around. Though weddings are often expensive and stressful, they are also one of those ceremonies that remind us that we walk by faith, and not only by sight. This world will last only as long as people are hopeful enough to walk into the unknown and make brave ventures with faith that so long as they act well, things will turn out alright in the end. Why destroy that hope by burdening it with the unnecessary weight of mistrust and cynicism? We need all the hope and optimism we can muster, as they alone make the dark days worth enduring. The world has enough despair as it is.

*Here is the passage in question:

"I consider a country-dance as an emblem of marriage. Fidelity and complaisance are the principal duties of both; and those men who do not choose to dance or marry themselves, have no business with the partners or wives of their neighbours.”

”But they are such very different things!”

” – That you think they cannot be compared together.”

“To be sure not. People that marry can never part, but must go and keep house together. People that dance only stand opposite each other in a long room for half an hour.”

“And such is your definition of matrimony and dancing. Taken in that light certainly, their resemblance is not striking; but I think I could place them in such a view. You will allow, that in both, man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal; that in both, it is an engagement between man and woman, formed for the advantage of each; and that when once entered into, they belong exclusively to each other till the moment of its dissolution; that it is their duty, each to endeavour to give the other no cause for wishing that he or she had bestowed themselves elsewhere, and their best interest to keep their own imaginations from wandering towards the perfections of their neighbours, or fancying that they should have been better off with anyone else. You will allow all this?”

“Yes, to be sure, as you state it, all this sounds very well; but still they are so very different. I cannot look upon them at all in the same light, nor think the same duties belong to them.”

“In one respect, there certainly is a difference. In marriage, the man is supposed to provide for the support of the woman, the woman to make the home agreeable to the man; he is to purvey, and she is to smile. But in dancing, their duties are exactly changed; the agreeableness, the compliance are expected from him, while she furnishes the fan and the lavender water. That, I suppose, was the difference of duties which struck you, as rendering the conditions incapable of comparison.”

“No, indeed, I never thought of that.” (Chapter 10)