The Perfect Princess Wedding
Hello my pretties!
Do you want a little story today? Let's have story time.
Personally, I hate wedding culture. I don't hate that it exists, I just hate it for myself. Throwing a big princess party for me and my Ken doll just seems like a giant pretentious embarrassment. And I hate that it is shoved onto women because "that's what women want", when, surprise!, women are not all the same.
And nowhere is wedding culture more pronounced than in Mormonism, complete with the castle-temple at the center of your wedding day. Temple marriage is a big deal for Mormons. It is the biggest deal. And I mean the BIGGEST deal.
Because it is such a big deal, every bride-to-be is very proud of their impending temple marriage. Wedding invitations feature the temple, plus the announcement of the wedding inside the giant glowing building. Even if you aren't invited inside, they want everyone to know they are worthy to enter.
Temple marriage means you are worthy of entering the temple. Worthiness means commitment to the Mormon lifestyle and paying ten percent of your income. It means no sex outside of marriage. That means you didn't have sex with your fiancé before your wedding day. (You have two separate interviews with two grown men asking about your sex life to ensure this.) It means you have a huge amount of self control. It means you get the thumbs up from all your Mormon peers.
When I got engaged at twenty-eight, I was still Mormon so I was not immune to the idea that temple marriage was the goal. Just like every other bride, I wanted my temple wedding because that's what God wanted for me, but I did not want it to be a thing. So I created a wedding invitation without mention of the temple.
"This just announces your wedding," my mom said. "Aren't you getting married in the temple?"
"Yes," I said.
"Then you need to say that you're getting married in the temple," she said.
"Why? That only matters if they are going to the wedding. This is just an announcement. They don't need to know where it is."
"What about the people who are going to the wedding?"
"They get a separate insert with the information on it."
"So you're not going to tell people you're getting married in the temple?"
"No."
"But that's what people want to know. That's why they read these."
"It's really none of their business."
"You need to put it on there," she insisted.
When I told my fiancé about the conversation with my mom, he agreed with her. "Everyone wants to know," he said.
So I changed it even though people didn't need to know whether I had sex with my fiancé or not. That was basically the whole temple conversation. Either you had temples on your wedding announcements or people whispered behind their hands. I'm still annoyed about all that.
I got married two more times after that and the last time I got married I was completely out of the church and didn't care what anyone thought. My wedding dress had red flowers on it and showed my shoulders which is definitely not temple worthy. I was also living with my fiancé for over a year before we got married and we had alcohol at the wedding, sooooo, it was fun. And I didn't have to invite my parents's friends.
Happy national alcohol screening day!
With love and kisses,
Sophia Skyy
Comments
Post a Comment