Your Wedding Tutorial and Toolkit

Ever wonder why women of all ages cry at weddings?  You are about to find out.

You have proposed, your girlfriend is now your fiancee’ and you are planning a wedding. Sh-t, hot dawg, go figure:  “I’m engaged!”  This is pretty cool, you think.  Everybody’s happy, I’m happy, this wasn’t so hard.  A kind of warm fuzziness engulfs you. Life is good.

Fasten your seatbelt.

You are getting married. Married! Your girlfriend-fiancee’ soon is going to be your “wife.” “Wife!” That’s a legal term, BTW, used in mortgages, court documents and other sticky-wicket contractual garbage. Your former girlfriend, now fiancee’ and bride-to-be, isn’t alone in having gone through a major life change. You, my friend, are also going to undergo an almost cellular transformation. You are now her fiance’ and you are going to be (in short order) her “husband.” Sounds kind of dated and obsolete, doesn’t? And heavy, as in heavy obligations and responsibilites. And it is. Traditions and terminology drag their feet, and some things don’t change.  Or change only slightly year to year. Weddings are one of those things.

Weddings are a big deal.  This is important to get through your head right now, upfront, immediately.  Whether large or small, weddings are a very big deal to all concerned.  And you will soon be amazed at the number of people who are concerned.

Weddings are a big deal not just to you and your bride, but to: all of your relatives (some of which you haven’t seen or talked to in years and maybe even don’t like and don’t really like you, either), all of her relatives, friends, her friends, enemies (if you have any, she doesn’t), employers, her employer, employees, her employees, customers/clients, hers too, dentist, hers too, physician, hers too, insurance agent, hers too, banker, hers too, dry cleaner, hers too, stock broker, hers too, and (even) your dog.  And her dog (or cat) too.  Oh, and the IRS and the creditors of both of you guys.

Some of the big deal of weddings is related to the change in legal status of both parties.  That part, compared to the following, is no sweat.  No problemo.  There are clear-cut objective ways of handling that part of getting married.

A wedding of any kind has two important, organically inter-dependent components:  emotional and financial. Every groom wannabe needs to understand this principle if he wants to survive and enjoy the coming months.

The real challenge of pulling off a successful wedding lies in respecting these two components and prepping yourself for dealing with the perils, land mines and booby-traps that will wound and possibly  demolish the uninformed.

Weddings are emotionally loaded events. Wedding planning is an emotionally loaded journey you and your fiancee’ are making together to the altar. Many, if not most, of the tenderness and fragility in the feelings of others in this trek to the altar are going to be lost on you. Sudden outbursts, tears and angry words may appear unprovoked and ridiculous to you, but the fact is you probably did something unwittingly to provoke them and such situations might have been avoided. Forget the ridiculous part, that argument will get you nowhere and only make matters worse. That is why you need to study and prepare carefully.