Attack of the Green-eyed Monster

Since I started this blog, I have waxed lyrical on everything from bizarre celebrity weddings to the plethora of traditions surrounding nuptials, along with producing many, MANY posts about my table centrepiece dilemmas. However, I have outlined very few of my own experiences. This is mainly because, as myself and D's wedding is some time away, I don't have much to talk about.

Apart from, that is, the trouble I've been having with an emotion I started to experience soon after I got engaged, which has caught me largely off guard: jealousy.

A jealous bride-to-be? Surely not! Yet it should come as little surprise that the thing making me feel like the Green-eyed Monster is the very same thing that has pushed me towards the edge of a stress-induced breakdown in the past few months. That is, other people's weddings. Admittedly, I've largely brought it on myself, as before I was ever engaged I vowed I would never read a wedding blog or magazine. This was very sage advice I should have stuck to.

As it is, I can't help but indulge in the odd glance and I often head immediately to the real-life wedding section. It is this that's my downfall. As I flick through picture after picture of meadows filled with tables covered in gingham, laughing people cavorting through a dressing up box and filling up on ice-cream from the van that has been hired especially for the day, I feel the envy start to bubble up. Looking at snaps of the couples posing on Portobello Road, larking about between the stalls (just to really rub it in that not only have they had a cool, London wedding, but they have also been shopping for vintage loveliness) I can feel myself tense with rage. Then there are those brides who get choppered into the ceremony, present each of the guests with a Faberge egg as a favour and spend their photoshoot frolicking in a cornfield wearing a pair of Louboutins - which would fill even a saint with unparalleled jealousy.

But just what is it that's making me envious? The Louboutins obviously, although I lack sympathy with anyone who would spend that much money on shoes only to traipse around a muddy field in them (and white satin is hardly the most hip of materials when it comes to ever wearing the heels again). But what else is causing the Green-eyed Monster to surface?

After all, it's not like they are all my dream wedding. Every one I read about is completely different from the last, ranging from shabby to city chic. And while I may wish I had some of the elements at my own wedding that I see in these pictures (an ice-cream van would be ace - just perhaps not in Manchester in February) - others are absolutely the last thing I would covet (any type of enforced fun, folk songs around the campfire, Cinderella-style carriages.)

Undoubtedly, reading all of these stories has made me stressed, reminding me of how much there is left to do and providing me with inspiration, thereby creating even more work for myself. But that's not what's prompting the envy.

Anyway, I've finally worked out what it is. There's one thing every single photo and account shares - shiny, happy joy. Every bride I look at or read about looks happy, gushing about it being the best day of her life. It doesn't matter whether they partied in a castle or on a barge, they're all happy because, after all that planning, they've finally had their big day.

So, it's the smiles I'm jealous of. I have 11 months to go until I experience that level of joy - and that leaves a lot of time to stress about whether or not to hire an ice-cream van for the reception.

Hanging on the telephone

Any regular readers of my blog (and you're most likely a mythical being as rare as Bigfoot) may have come to the conclusion I have become obsessed with flowers, ribbons, feathers and all other frivolous frippery associated with the world of weddings. And you'd be right. Indeed, when I first started this blog, my own fingers typed the words:

We all know the curse of the Bridezilla, but what about the Bridezmoaner? Who knows a bride who hasn't moaned about something? Even a teensy bit? Perhaps it's that the flowers aren't what they asked for, or they can't find the perfect dress (more of that in a later post). Somehow, the moans squeeze in, leaving everyone else wanting to scream "you're getting married! Cheer up, what's wrong with you?" And well they should. 

I know - I feel ashamed. I have become everything I hate and I will punish myself severely later.

So, I thought I should take a breather from banging on about bouquets and bunting and instead focus on some other (clearly less important) issues. Such as what you need to do to actually get married in the first place.

To begin with, you have to decide what type of wedding you want. Given as D is a non-believer and I haven't set foot inside a church for years, we opted for a civil ceremony. In my own experience, and on the world stage, religion seems to have a habit of making things very complicated so I was hoping that by not inviting it to our wedding, arranging everything would be easier.

However, by not choosing a religious ceremony, you are then left with the default option of putting your big day in the hands of the council. I can think of few better examples of incurring God's wrath than this.

First, you have to find out which local authority you fall under (pretty simple - it's the same one you pay your hard-earned cash to every month and hope your bins will be collected on time. But I won't go there - late-collection-of-wheelie-bin moaning is something best left to readers of the Daily Mail and listeners of the Jeremy Vine show).

Then, you have to find out what council jurisdiction your venue is under. In my case, this was way more confusing than it should have been, as the venue has a Cheshire address yet is under Trafford council, despite the Trafford venues I looked at coming under Sale council. And so on and so forth.

Once you have established who to contact, you have to wait until exactly one year before your planned wedding date to call the venue's local authority, book a registrar and then enter a one-month race against time to call your actual council and schedule an appointment to declare your intention to marry (no, a Facebook change of relationship status will not suffice here) before the deadline passes.

All fine and dandy, except it involves ringing one or, in most cases, two councils, who are not known for rushing to the phone. In fact, one of the local authorities I had to deal with would put me through the usual seventh circle of doom that is the never-ending menu of options, only to then say - when you had finally made it to the holy grail of starting to ring a living human being - "All our operators are busy" and then HANG UP, so I had to call back and start the whole process again.

Once the appointment is made, you get to skip off and declare your intention to marry. This is less romantic than it sounds and involves paying a large amount of cash to flash your passport, before undergoing individual interviews. I (as this blog's title should attest to) have a habit of feeling guilty under questioning, even when there is absolutely nothing to feel guilty about, which resulted in me having a total mind block, forgetting where I live and pausing a beat too long when asked if I had an alias.

Anyway, myself and D have now completed the formalities and can legally wed! And while it's been complicated and involved me listening to a lot of tinkley telephone muzak, it is also done and dusted inside of three months. If only picking table centrepieces was as easy.