No sooner had I gotten engaged than my friend bought me a book about wedding planning. Which, initially (and beyond the appreciation to my friend for being very thoughtful and helpful), induced a medium-sized eye roll. Wedding book, come onnnn.
I’m not really a wedding book kind of gal, insofar as the things that I wanted from my wedding weren’t things that I thought I would read about in a book. Also, and somewhat unfortunately, I’m not really one for soliciting advice. I wish I were better at seeking and taking advice, but, generally, I’m not. I’m introspective, but also highly (and probably overly) confident and probably kinda self-righteous, if I really had to be honest. So when it comes to planning a wedding, which, granted, I had not done before, I still was somehow not particularly into hearing what someone else had to say on the matter. I mean, how could they know what I, the unique snowflake that I am, wanted?
http://www.megkeene.com
But I read the book anyway over Christmas and found some of it to be helpful, and much of it to be interesting.
First off, A Practical Wedding by Meg Keene is well titled. She goes through a LOT of wedding information and circumstances but presents the information in a conversational, regular-person tone. She lives in San Francisco, and I was kinda feeling like we could be friends after I read the book (Hey Meg, wanna meet up for happy hour?). She was calm and accessible, yet thorough and real about the whole thing.
While I did gather some helpful ideas on how to mentally process a few things about planning a wedding (first steps, prioritizing, talking with family members), I would say that probably 50-75% of the book did not apply to me personally. This was largely because I was not interested in many things that brides often are (dresses, bridesmaids, cake, decorations, wedding registries, flowers, wedding favors), nor did I have family circumstances that induced so much of the stress and difficulty that seems to happen for others (overbearing mom, overbearing mother-in-law, people paying for things and wanting to have them their way, deceased parent, etc.).
Also, I couldn’t help but notice that the book mentions crying a lot. Not like crying while you listen to your beloved read his/her wedding vows to you on the day-of, but, like, crying as you fight with your mom or spouse-to-be or bridesmaids or just crying about the all-consuming overwhelmingness of wedding planning. I’m not a crier, generally speaking. So, I pretty much felt like this wasn’t going to be my challenge. And spending what I considered a significant amount of the book discussing this aspect was somewhat interesting to me, as I assume this applies to a lot of other people.
Overall, I would recommend this book as a great catch-all introduction to wedding planning, even for the person who thinks they may not need/want a book about wedding planning. It’s a great resource, not just for the information that it provides about logistical and process-related wedding planning, but also as an interesting insight into the psychology of the modern wedding, whether or not you subscribe to it yourself. It’s a well-organized, easy read that really does walk you through some of the things to brace yourself for (or thoroughly enjoy… you can see my default view on wedding planning) as you go through the process of becoming someone’s spouse.