Perfection

No one under the sun is more concerned with perfection than a woman in her 30s who is getting married for the first time.

Yesterday I went to a fabulous store in the Gift Center on Brannan called Hyegraph that specializes in wedding invitations. This store offers a 20 percent discount off of the total cost of your order if you mention the "Here Comes the Guide" website. I knew immediately that this was "my" store.

When I arrived, I discoverd that not only do they do wedding invitations, but they also sell ring bearer pillows, guest books, guest book pens, photo albums, the list goes on. It's a one-stop shop for all your wedding trinket needs. I had to resist the urge to buy a ring bearer pillow on the spot. I figured it might be good to buy it when the fiance and I return together.

While I was browsing through the five hundred books of wedding inivitation designs my attention was drawn to a couple sitting at the next table who was placing their invitation order. Originally I took note of them because I heard them say that their wedding date was June 16th, one day before mine. My first thought was, "Great! I'm finally ON TIME with something." If _they_ are just now placing there invitation order, then I'm not late in placing mine. I could tell by the look of the couple, that THEY woudn't do anything late.

As the couple's invitation ordering conversation continued with the sales person, I overheard a few bits and pieces. They wanted THIS to be olive colored but not THAT. And they complained about the the fact that figuring out the wording was the most difficult part of the whole invitation ordering process. At the end of the conversation the groom said,"One more thing to check off our to-do list!"

It's like a club that you join... The Wedding Planning Club. Everyone in the Wedding Planning Club has a "To-Do" List and your sole purpose in life from the minute you get engaged until the moment you say "I Do" is to check things off of the "To Do" list. You have no other purpose in life. You are ruled by The List and The Due Dates and Deposits and the Balances Due. You don't pay attention to your career. You forget to socialize. You only go to the gym because your arms will look fat in your strapless gown if you don't. You pay attention to the people who are in your wedding party and the parents who are making financial contributions, and ignore everyone else. And you check, check, check things off your To-Do list. Sometimes you do things, just so you can check them off the list. Sometimes you check things off the list that you don't plan to do and will never do, just because it feels really good to put a check in a box on "The List."

So this couple was IN the club... basking in the glory of another checked-off list item. But alas, just as the guy was beginning to feel some sense of relief as they put that all-important "check" next to the "Order Wedding Invitations" line item, his fiance started complaining about her ring. I couldn't hear the entire conversation. But I did hear the most imporant and poinient part. The bride said, "We HAVE to go to back the jeweler because I really DO NOT like how the stone is placed in the setting!" When I heard this I wanted to explode with laughter. Was she kidding? She said it with such angst and disdain. She was clearly focused on nothing other than the probably totally imperceptable imperfection of the exact placement of her stone in her ring's setting. There was nothing else in her mind or in her life other than this imperfection. She couldn't even bask in the relief of checking off a major "To Do" from her list. The very second that they finished ordering their invitations, she began complaining! The groom responded with some vague reassurances. In that moment I thought that the groom should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for putting up with this woman and her absurd fixation. The bride stood up from the table and went to the sales girl at the counter. She asked with pointed urgency, "So when will this order be called in? Will it be tomorrow?!?!" The implied message was that the order better be called in tomorrow or else there would be hell to pay. Again I lauged internally at the absurdity of the bride's urgency with every detail. The sales girl made some noises about how the store owner was out sick so she didn't know exactly when the order would be called in. I thought for a moment that the bride would explode. I could sense her desire to explode, in fact. "Oh my, why is he sick? Is he okay???" She didn't care about the store owner. She cared about her invitations, and moreover the timeliness of the ordering of her invitations. The groom leaned over and gave the bride the sweetest, most endearing kiss on the forehead. What is it that allows men to be able to put up with the insanity of the 30-something bride? I could tell just by looking at this woman that nothing was perfect enough, nothing was fast enough, and nothing was satisfying enough for her. The poor thing. I was so glad in that moment that I was not her. And then... of course I realized... that I am her.

For the past four days I have looked at my two front teeth in my rearview mirror of my car just about every 30 seconds or whenever the traffic patterns would allow. I can't decide if the color is okay. And I need to look at them five hundred times every day to figure out if I should go back to the dentist or not. When I was looking through the books of invitations, I kept asking if there was another book with this sort of thing or that sort of thing that I could look at. What was put in front of me was not good enough. I kept wanting there to be something else. Something better. Something different. Something - perfect. Thank goodness my fiance picked out the ring on his own. I love the ring, exactly how it is, because he picked it out. If I had had to pick it out, we'd still be looking at rings. And I'd be going back to the jeweler every other day having the stone re-set and re-re-set and re-re-re-set. But because my fiance picked it out, it's perfect as-is. It's the sentimentality factor. If he does it, it's sentimental and perfect. If I do it, it cost too much and no amount of human inspired craftsmanship is perfect enough - not in cosmetic dental work, not in the setting of stones in a ring, not in the graphic design or printing of Save the Date cards, not in anything. Nothing is good enough.

I cannot figure out why brides are chronically dissatisfied, eternally anxious about planning, and expect the precision of brain surgeons from every wedding vendor they encounter. The sales person said to the couple, "I always tell people that it's only ONE DAY." I guess that's code for "chill out, bitch" - which is what she probably really wanted to say to the bride. And here I thought I was the only person on the face of the earth who was obsessing about details. At least I've never questioned whether or not my stone was properly put in it's setting. Whew - one less thing to worry about.

I didn't actually order any invitations yesterday. I found some things that I liked at that store. But I didn't find anything that was perfect.