The Essential Guide to Gay and Lesbian Weddings (27 page)

“We wanted to involve the people we care about, and by that I mean
all
the people we care about. Twenty-two people spoke at the wedding. No, we weren't bored; but then again, they were talking about
us
.”

“Even though Jessica wasn't religious, I felt the need to have a ceremony in a house of worship and wear my grandmother's wedding gown. We had a beautiful candlelight ceremony at a Unitarian Church.”

“Food is really important to us and our circle of friends. So we had a quickie ceremony followed by a sit-down dinner catered by our favorite restaurant.”

“All right, so we're a little theatrical… the ceremony lasted an hour and a half. People sang, people recited Shakespeare; there was even a skit. But there wasn't a person there who didn't have the theater experience of his or her life.”

“I don't think weddings should be a big deal, made into a three-ring circus. It's a solemn occasion where you're pledging your heart. We said our vows at sunrise and had twenty-five friends for a great breakfast.”

“I figured if I was going to do it I'd go ahead and invite some of my partners from the law firm. We had a private ceremony, then rented a midsize room at a downtown hotel and had hors d'oeuvres and dancing. It had a corporate feel, but then, we're corporate kind of women.”

It may be right about this time that you decide that the two of you will never reach an agreement
(or, for that matter, the altar) and that maybe you should just have Chinese food delivered, watch “The One with the Lesbian Wedding” from season two of
Friends,
and forget the whole thing. Don't panic; this is normal, this is universal. What Joe Average finds most overwhelming about planning one of these is that every decision hinges on a previous decision. We call it…

The Synergistic Theorem of Wedding Planning

You won't know how many people you can invite until you know where you're having the reception; you can't really decide where to have the reception until you know what's available and affordable; if you start looking for a place to have the reception, you have to decide on how large a space you need to hold all your guests; which brings you back to deciding how many people you're going to invite.

One reason you're probably feeling overwhelmed at this point is that you have too many options. The quickest way we know of to focus in on reality is to consider the almighty dollar. For example, if as part of your festivities you envision writing your names across the sky, you'll need to budget between $1,000 and $5,000 for your aerial announcement, leaving you no money to pay the minister. Eventually everybody needs to hammer out a budget. It may constrain your wants and desires, but it will keep you from getting carried away in areas that don't really matter to you, and it will help you figure out ways to get what you really want. If you have $2,000 to spend on your entire wedding, and your main priority is a reception at a four-star restaurant, take a dozen friends to the best dinner of their lives. If you wouldn't dream of getting married without your one hundred best friends, but your pockets are empty, go to a park and have a barbecue. We'll get more into budget specifics later, but for now try to think about how much money you can raise to put on this shindig. (Reflect on how much it can cost you to have friends over for a Super Bowl party—and that's just Doritos, a few six-packs, and maybe a pizza.)

There are some other cold, hard realities, and these have to do with being gay. (You knew this would come up.) If you're Catholic and have always dreamed of a nuptial mass in Saint Patrick's, perhaps you should come back at a later date. If you've always wanted to have your parents walk you down the aisle and they deal with your sexual orientation by popping Prozac, you might have to make some adjustments. If the gang at the country club doesn't know that you and Brendan are more than tennis partners, having your ceremony there may bring you farther out than you're willing to go. Issues such as these can be daunting, even depressing, if you let them get out of perspective, but none of them need spoil your wedding if you keep in mind your original reasons for having this event.

The sad truth is that Mick Jagger was right: “You can't always get what you want.” But don't
forget the second part of that refrain: “You just might find… you get what you need.”

By now the wedding wheels should be turning in your head. That can only mean one thing: you're ready for your first checklist. In the chapters to come we will deconstruct the following seemingly unanswerable questions:

For Brides- or Grooms-to-Be: Your Very First Checklist

INITIAL DECISIONS:

You may not have made these decisions yet, but you need to make them almost immediately.

Have you selected a wedding date and time?

How many people do you want to invite?