The scheduling of the actual weddings, however, meant that the following spring would be gruesome. Caryn’s wedding was the first weekend in June, Megan’s the final, and Sharon’s mother had booked the second weekend, leaving me worried about what I would do if either of my siblings selected one of those three dates.
Thankfully, I was spared having to make such a Sophie’s choice, as Amy (or, if we’re being honest here, my mother) opted for the last open June weekend. Jake and Madison announced that theirs would be in the middle of May in Mexico. I confirmed to Jake that yes, I had a valid passport, and asked if Madison had gotten the flowers I sent, as I had gotten an arrival confirmation email but hadn’t heard from her.
“I think so,” he said. “Mads—are any of those flowers we got from Lily?” I scrunched up my nose. If she hadn’t even mentioned them to him, that wasn’t a good sign about my apology being accepted. “Yup. She did. Sorry, this place is starting to look like a flower shop.”
I rolled my eyes. “Is Madison mad at me?”
“I don’t know,” he said, and then yelled away from the phone, “Hey Mads, are you mad at Lily?”
“Jake! What the hell? Stop!”
“What? She said she’s not.”
“Great. Thanks.” Note to self: anything you say to your brother from now on will be repeated to Madison. But I could either stress myself out about my slipup or let it go. I chose the latter. I had made a peace offering. If she was lying to Jake about being mad at me, that was his problem, not mine.
And now I had to factor the expense of Mexico into my wedding budget, which I guessed would run me about fifteen hundred dollars for airfare and hotel. And that was in May, so I only had eight months to prepare.
Suddenly, I was at two-fifty a paycheck, five hundred a month, which, even if I prepared all my meals at home, was going to be an issue.
I buckled down for the month of September and lived a simple, puritanical life of sacrifice for my friends and family. I opted to pre-drink at home before I went out, downgraded to drugstore mascara, splurged on Starbucks only three days a week, packed my lunch every night before work, and made a goal of putting away five hundred dollars that first month.
Granted, my wine budget increased a bit as the brother/sister wedding whammy was taking an emotional toll in the form of phone calls and texts between my mother, myself, and Amy.
“In my day, your sister was your maid of honor. What are people going to think?”
I sighed, having had this conversation with my mother multiple times already. “It’s not that weird, Mom. Especially with the age difference and all.”
“I just don’t understand why you won’t tell her that you want to be her maid of honor.”
“It’s not my wedding or my place to tell her that. And if I’m being honest, I don’t want to be.”
“Of course you do.”
“Mom, I’m in four other weddings. I don’t need that kind of responsibility.”
“You don’t mind being Megan’s maid of honor.”
I rubbed my forehead in frustration. “If Amy wanted me to be, I would say yes. But she already asked Ashlee, and I promise that’s fine.”
“She may still change her mind.”
“Please don’t nag her about it, Mom. It’s really not worth it.”
She huffed, but didn’t argue. “I’m just grateful that you have all of these weddings coming up.”
Had I been giving her my full attention, I would have known better than to ask why, but despite frequent requests to not call me with nonemergencies at work, I was still fielding at least four calls a week from her while trying to do my job. This was her first year of retirement and she hadn’t quite found her niche yet. But I was proofreading a proposal and therefore asked the question.
“It’s just such a wonderful opportunity. I’m sure you’ll meet someone at one of them.”
And there went all attention to the proposal. For a split second, I wished I could be honest with my mother and tell her about the mystery groomsman. But while the intent would be to horrify her into stopping the constant pressure, I knew full well it would have the opposite effect; she would insist I find out who it was in order to date and/or marry him.
“Mom, I’m not trying to meet someone at one of these weddings.”
“Whyever not?”
“Because it’s not about me. I’m there to support my friends.”
“And your friends support you, that’s how it works. Everyone knows weddings are a wonderful place to meet people.”
I thought back to the singles table, where I had been placed, probably at my mother’s insistence, at my cousin Tina’s wedding. Everyone else in my family was at the same table together, whereas my table felt like the scene from Animal House where they keep introducing the pledges to the same losers over and over again.
“That was probably true when you were single, but it’s a little different now.”
She huffed again. “I just want you to be happy.”
“I am happy.”
“Are you? You go home to an empty apartment every night and sit there alone.”
My hackles rose. “Actually, I go home to my roommate, who’s one of my closest friends, and either hang out with her or go out with other friends. I’m not exactly sitting in the dark working on a hope chest.”
“That’s not a life. You need a family. It’s time.”
I opened my mouth to say what I wanted to say: that my birth family was currently a great example of why I didn’t want a family yet. I didn’t want to settle down and pop out three kids in the suburbs, then nag them until they got married and had their own kids. I didn’t want to be her.
But the words didn’t come out. They never seemed to with her. Which was probably for the best. And I understood that she meant well. It wasn’t that she wanted me to be her, she just didn’t understand that there were other definitions of happiness than hers.
Besides, my generation was the first one that really was finding a different life than the previous generations had. We didn’t have to get married and have kids in our twenties if we didn’t want to. For the non-independently wealthy of us, our careers kind of had to come first if we wanted any sense of financial security before we started those families. And while my parents were still happily married, I had seen enough couples who weren’t to know better than to settle for any of the guys I had met so far.
Was there a way to explain that to my mother that she could understand? No. I had tried before.
I looked at the clock. The proposal was due by the end of the day and I was only halfway through it. “Okay,” I said to keep the peace and get her off the phone. “I’ll try to meet someone.”
“Thank you, sweetheart.” She paused. “Now if you could also work on your sister about this maid of honor thing . . .”
“I’m hanging up now.”
“Okay, okay, I love you.”
“I love you too, Mom.”
I pressed “End” and shook my head. She couldn’t help herself and was never going to change.
CHAPTER FIVE
From: Caryn Donaldson [[email protected]]
To: [bridesmaids]
Subject: Wedding newsletter volume 1
Date: September 24
Hi girls! Just thought I’d get a group email going so you all have each other’s contact info and so you can add my new email to your address books! Of course, it’ll change after the wedding to [email protected], so you can add that as well, but I’m going to use this one until then. I’ll still get emails to my old address, but I’d prefer you use this one for all wedding-related correspondence. Thanks!
Can you believe we only have a little under nine months until the wedding? There’s so much to do between now and then!
I’m going dress shopping the next three Saturdays, and I thought it would be fun if you all came with me and we made a day of it! I have an appointment at three boutiques at Tyson’s Corner this weekend, three in DC the weekend after, and four more in Maryland the third weekend. I’d love it if you came to all three, but just let me know what works with your schedules and I’ll make sure the salons know we’re coming. This is just for my dress. We’ll schedule another day to go look for your dresses!
Oh, and try to keep your weekends open in May. I’d like to do the shower and bachelorette separate weekends and we’ll need another weekend to figure out hair treatments, etc.