Jeanne Hamilton - Wedding Etiquette Hell: The Brides Bible to Avoiding Everlasting Damnation

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Contents

To Tim

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank my dear husband, who has been my staunchest supporter, my best editor, my rock of standards, and one of the most gentlemanly persons of my acquaintance. Thank you for stopping whatever work you were doing to listen to hundreds of EtiquetteHell.com stories. A hearty thank-you to my three children, who shouldered the housecleaning, cooking, and yardwork while I was working on the book. Thank you to Phil, who continues to appreciate the irony. My gratitude also goes to my agent, Stephanie Rostan, who has been the model of gracious professionalism and friendship. I would also like to thank St. Martins Press, for believing in the Etiquette Hell concept and helping save brides everywhere from damnation. And finally, thank you to the fans who make EtiquetteHell.com the interesting and rewarding place that it is.

Introduction

Few know what theyre doing. They are endowed with incredible authority, are pressured to please everyone, and produce the effects of a dictatorship within the strictures of democracy. E LISE M AC A DAM

G LAD TIDINGS! Y OU ARE ENGAGED to be married! You may be reading this book because you are, as brides across the Western world are, genetically hardwired to hightail it to the bookstore to rummage through stacks of three-ring-binder wedding planners and four-inch-thick tomes known as etiquette books as soon as Romeo rises from his kneeling proposal. Most brides become etiquette scholars for the duration of their wedding planning, studying these textbooks of anti-tackiness with the seriousness of a Ph.D. candidate.

But what passes for etiquette is often nothing more than glorified traditions with entire chapters devoted to diamond cuts, carat weights, what certain flowers signify, the color of the wedding dress, fifty zillion ways to address an envelope, lists of music choices, and how a groom can remove the brides garter with his teeth with the utmost decorum. Even worse, there is the new etiquette, often touted on Internet wedding Web sites, which throws real etiquette away entirely and gives brides carte blanche to do whatever their little bridal hearts desire.

From the time the engagement ring encircles the finger to the start of the honeymoon, a bride and groom walk a tightrope across a wedding-planning chasm. They are constantly trying to balance their desires for the perfect wedding with the expectations of guests and family, aiming for the target of a wedding everyone enjoys. The wedding-planning path is fraught with opportunities to dive right into Etiquette Hell. You have the opportunity to do this well, to the blessing of all, or do this poorly, to the detriment of those whom you love.

Your wedding is hugely important to you; it can also have a huge effect upon those around you and your relationships with them. Friends and family can be silent victims of bridal wrath if things go wrong or of bridal indifference if things go right. They bear their wounds without comment, lest they be accused of ruining the wedding day. Many brides skip merrily along, totally unaware of how bad their behavior is, while their friends and family pour out their grievances to me, Miss Jeanne, at www.etiquettehell.com. What they may have been afraid to tell the bride, they tell me in graphic detail.

Many faux pas occur from simple ignorance, raising the possibility of tripping accidentally into Etiquette Hell. However, victims of your accidental faux pas wont always be forgiving, nor will they be tolerant of your ignorance or aware of your good intentions. All they know is that you stepped all over their toes and it hurts! Emily Post is too polite to tell you the consequences of eschewing her etiquette advice. I have no such inhibitions in sounding the warning alarm that something is a bit amiss and heading south fast.

People do not nominate their nuptially minded friends and family for inclusion in Etiquette Hell for little slights that should be overlooked as part of loving one another. (And if they do, I boot them into Etiquette Hell themselves for pettiness.) Who really cares whether you wear a gold dress instead of white, or whether you have suits or tuxes on the groomsmen, or whether the reception punch matches the color of the bridesmaids dresses? Inconsequential decisions that are often defined as etiquette are not issues people care enough about to damn a couple into eternal social ostracism forever and ever, amen. The ire rises to the boiling point only when people are abused with presumptions on their time, finances, and generosity. Then they start banging out on their keyboard a flurry of verbiage venting their frustration to the concerned eyes of Miss Jeanne.

So, how does a bride execute the biggest social extravaganza of her life without ending up a social pariah? Unless the bride can afford the luxury of a wedding planner who handles every detail from A to Z, she faces the daunting task of coordinating a complicated event while meeting all the expectations of family, friends, vendors, and guests. Existing peacefully in society requires a delicate balance among all individuals, a certain amount of reciprocal courtesy and kindness. The stories presented in this book illustrate numerous civility rules. They are from real people about real brides and grooms. They are representative of the thousands of e-mails I receive annually bemoaning the loss of civility in our culture. While Miss Manners or Emily Post may wag their fingers and say, No, no, thou shalt not!, my presenting firsthand accounts of offended guests and friends has a greater grassroots impact that causes brides to sit up and pay attention. Wedding Etiquette Hell dismisses the stuffy fluff of high-society etiquette rules and concerns itself with issues of etiquette that really matter to people: what offends them, what inspires them to snickers of derision, what compels them to quietly put you on their no more gifts in my lifetime list or drop you off their social radar.

The focus of this book is the way you should behave as you attempt to coordinate the largest event of your life. In effect, you are the CEO of a limited-engagement endeavor, and your leadership will affect the motivation and morale of your staff. Human nature being what it is, even your best friends and closest family are still fallible beings and will make occasional gaffes or even present outright opposition to your well-thought-out plans. The way you handle these interpersonal relationships during the stressful parts of wedding planning will depend on your talent for diplomacy. It may also require your willingness to do the right thing despite the temptation to let fly with some deliciously rude remark to some nincompoop desperately deserving of your disdain.

Being civil does not mean you are a doormat, giving up all your hopes, dreams, and plans in order to keep the peace among friends and family. However, if you are asking people to expend time and money for your wedding, there has to be some consideration of their input and some effort at moving toward an equitable compromise that leaves everyone content. But its my day! you exclaim with some indignation. Isnt this the day youve been waiting for your whole life? Isnt it your turn to get the attention and have the party of your dreams? If the front covers of many wedding magazines are an indication, the wedding allegedly consists of only the bride; it is entirely her day. However, ponder for a moment just what a wedding is and who is involved. A wedding is a celebration and confirmation of relationshipsthe joining of two people, of two families, and of two sets of friends. Youll be happier and your attendants will be, too, if you approach wedding planning with a balanced perspective that includes a concern for the well-being of the people and the relationships involved, rather than concentrating only on how to execute the perfect wedding production!