money pit

so, i had a nightmare the other night.

(my friend josh, my sole blog reader, informed me recently that all my posts are sadtown complain-y diatribes and this makes me sound like a whiner.  i'm not offended by this for several reasons: 1) this is sadtown self-involved therapy - it's a blog; 2) i am a whiner; 3) josh is a very jealous person.)

so, anyway, i had this nightmare the other night: i realized, at about 3 pm one saturday afternoon, that it was the day of my wedding.  i hadn't done any preparation beyond what i've actually done in real life - i had a location, a photographer, a caterer, but had no music, no hair and makeup, no decorations.  and, i'd invited 100 people (which is also something i haven't done yet).  in this dream, i was frantic because i wasn't prepared at all for this day to be the magical fairyland it was supposed to be.  i literally thought, in this moment of REM genius, "i actually have to do my own hair?" as if that was the biggest travesty ever visited upon a person in the history of the human race.  in this dream, i tried to coordinate a wedding in two hours (while getting ready to do my own makeup, i suppose *gasp*).  

all joking aside, this dream was terrible.  it was awful.  i woke up stressed to my core, so much so that now i have this crazy palsy in my hands that makes me unwittingly clench my fingers into fists, even when i'm doing seemingly safe things like watching TV or driving my car.  and, i don't think it was the horror of doing my own hair that sent me over the edge in this nightmare.  it was the shock of having all these wedding details, which are stressing me out in reality nine months out from the date itself, all crushed into a two-hour time frame.

still, i know you're tsk-tsking to yourself about sarah the bridezilla having nightmares about the wedding.  if you're doing that, you sure as hell haven't gotten your feet wet planning an event like this.  my freak out is not, i assure you, an "oh my god, this embossed green invitation doesn't exactly match the embroidered overlay on my eighteen twenty-person dining tables in the mint ballroom" type of freak out.  my panic is more of a "how in the world am i going to justify the $10,000 this very modest ceremony is going to cost?" type of panic.  i was very cool about the whole thing until recently, when we realized we'd have to hire a caterer after our plans to keep the food and rentals in the family proved to be a little too naive.  this caterer is perfectly nice and helpful and charges a totally reasonable fee for providing all the tables, chairs, linens, silverware, plates and food for 100 people.  however, now that we've got most of the vendors, adding everything up is possible.  hence, the freak out.

surprisingly, though, i'm the only one in panic mode.  my mom actually thinks i'm worrying too much about money and am therefore somehow slighting myself (i guess because i got a pretty inexpensive dress).  it's just a very rude awakening.  i was (and am, to a certain degree) extremely casual about all of this and i still haven't been sucked into any of the wedding insanity that is rampant in the marriage business, but at this point, i feel like if i see another bridal magazine extolling the virtues of designer flower girl dresses or $2,000 (per 100) wedding invitations, i might lose my mind.

my issue is simple: i wanted to be married to luke.  i don't have some delusional fantasy about being married, i don't want a picture-perfect wedding day, i haven't dreamed about this since i was 7.  i've found the person i want to spend my life with and we think it would be amazing to celebrate that with our family and friends.  that is why we decided to have a wedding.  i'm excited about the day itself.  way excited.  it's just that wading through all the wedding mania and propaganda makes me insane.

end rant.