I hate this.

I love Robert very much and cannot wait to begin the part where we spend the rest of our lives together. I cannot wait for us to be "Man and Wife", "Two that are now One", "Mr and Mrs". Besides the fact that we will be married, it will also mean that the wedding will be over.

God, I cannot wait.

I'm so f**king tired of wedding BS that it's unbelievable!

You are just as married if you have a huge Saturday afternoon ceremony with 500 people there as you are if you run off to Vegas and get married in the middle of the week.I've always wanted to get married in the latter of the two ways.

I don't think I've EVER wanted an actual wedding where I walk down the aisle and all eyes are on me.

I'm not that kind of person.

I don't want to wear the big poofy white wedding dress.

I don't want to sit down and hand address 300 envelopes.

I don't want to write thank you notes for every gift we get.

I don't want to taste thirteen different types of cakes or pick out flowers to match the bridesmaid's dress, which I also don't want to pick out because I know someone is going to think that it's too tacky or that it make them look too fat.

I don't want to decide on what to serve my guests at the reception. Stuffed chicken breasts or Cocoa Puffs? If I do decide to go the Cocoa Puff route, do I serve it with whole milk or skim?

I don't want to worry about if my maid of honour remembered to bring my groom to be's ring to the ceremony.

I don't want to worry about choosing an updo or letting my hair flow on the big day.

I don't want anyone to miss out on an opportunity to celebrate with us. Think about it: a wedding is the one time in someone's life that you really get to celebrate with them and what they're doing. Unless you're one of the grandparents to be, you're probably not going to be invited to the birth of their children. You're sure as hell not going to be invited to the conception. You might be invited to an anniversary party, but nothing really changes. They were married before the party, and they'll still be married after the party. You're just celebrating something that's continuing.
The next real big thing that you might celebrate is their life, but they're not there, because it's their funeral.

*Sigh*

And that's exactly the reason that I've always wanted to elope. You're leaving everyone out. And when you leave everyone out, you're not really leaving anyone out. I mean, it's you, the person you're marrying, the person who's performing the ceremony and the person or people who are serving as witnesses. Five people at most. Two or three who you'll probably never see again.

Since we've been planning a wedding, I was excited for approximately a week. All of that went away when everyone was saying everything wasn't "traditional enough" and questioning why were were doing things that way. It was actually suggested at one point that we were doing things the way we were just to go AGAINST tradition.

Our first go 'round at wedding planning was a huge November wedding. Huge was an understatement. When the guest list hit 300, I decided it was getting too out of hand and we would never be able to afford it, so a smaller wedding was suggested.

That was going along fine until people started piping in with all of the people we were leaving out.

Even with the people we were leaving out, the guest list wasn't so out of control. But it was hard to plan an outdoor wedding for July. We wanted something simple, but people didn't get the concept of an informal wedding.

Then someone said something offhanded about having everyone dressing in Hawaiian shirts and shorts.

PERFECT! A LUAU!

For the first time I was excited. We had a theme, so it didn't feel like I was trying to "throw" a wedding together. It felt like I was trying to plan a party, at which I would get married. There's something that kicks in when someone hears "luau" that makes them know it's casual....exactly what I wanted.

Then came the aforementioned questioning about if we were doing things just to be untraditional.

For me, that sucked all of the fun out of the luau, and, by extension, the wedding.

Finally, I told Robert that if he wanted to not elope, he could plan it. I was done. I couldn't think about wedding stuff anymore.

That night we talked to his mom and she said that she didn't care if we had a tiny wedding, but her one requirement was that she was there. So finally we decided on having just our parents there as witnesses.

Of course, I had a few days to mill this over and realized that if we were going to have anyone there, I wanted to have everyone there.

I could hear the disappointment in people's voices when they heard that they weren't going to be one of the very few at the wedding.

I always assumed that I would elope. I never thought I'd be planning an actual wedding. Since I have been thinking about an actual wedding, I've been worrying about hurting someone's feelings by not inviting them or overlooking someone that I really should ask to be in my wedding party. The reason that I liked the idea of eloping was that you're just as married and there's very little planning involved.

Is there going to be a way of getting married that doesn't involve eloping that I'll be happy with? Probably. Will it happen on July 23rd of this year? Doubtful. That's only 112 days away. Not much time to plan anything elaborate.

I'm ready for it to be about a year from now. All of this wedding stuff will be over. Hopefully all the hurt feelings of the people who aren't invited will have passed and we'll either be married or planning some huge, elaborate wedding in which everyone we've ever gone to school with or sat next to at church will be invited.

*sigh* Okay....I feel a lot better than I did when I sat down an hour ago at the keyboard.

I've realized that one of us is going to be disappointed any way we go. If we elope, Robert will hate it. If we plan a wedding, I will hate it. Literally, Robert has said he's fine with anything I decide except for eloping. Do you know how hard it is to plan something you don't want?? Why can't we be a normal couple where the guy wants to elope and the girl wants the wedding? I mean, at least then when I was planning a wedding, I would be doing something I want.

I hate this.

I hate this more than anyone will ever know.