Dear
Etiquetteer:
What is the proper response to the announcement of a friend or social
acquaintance’s engagement? I'm assuming it's not, “How nice
for you...you're so lucky....I wish I had a boyfriend.”
Dear Alone and
Bitter:
How clever of
you to observe that the newly engaged could not possibly care about
your pain, choosing only to share their joy. Etiquetteer is tempted
to give you a condescending pat on the head, but that wouldn’t
be very polite.
When told the
news of someone’s engagement, sincerely express congratulations
to the two parties that they’ve found their soulmates and wish
them a long and happy life together. Later, when you are alone, you
may weep the bitter tears
of the denied into your margarita, but Etiquetteer warns you that
neither tears nor margaritas are very kind to the complexion.
Dear Etiquetteer:
I think if you are a single person invited to a wedding you must be
able to bring a guest. No one wants to sit alone at a wedding; even
old aunt Martha would like to bring a gal pal. I think if you can’t
afford to invite your friend and a guest don’t invite so many
people. I think it is EXTREMELY rude when brides try to pull this
“it’s proper etiquette” to invite single people by
themselves.
Dear Alone, Bitter, and Entitled:
Oh please. Etiquetteer encourages you to look beyond your narrow window
of self-interest for a moment to consider the bride’s predicament.
Were she to follow your plan, she would have to deny family and close
friends the chance to celebrate the most special day of her life to
accommodate total strangers, asked because of the social insecurities
and selfishness of the unattached.
Far from sitting
alone, you’ll be with others who know the happy couple, with
whom you can discuss any number of things: Aunt Ida’s sciatica,
what they teach in those schools nowadays, dieting, metaphysics, higher
Malthusianism,
the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow, and what is unfortunately
the most popular topic of reception chat -- whether or not the bride
should be wearing white.
If you feel so strongly that you cannot attend a wedding without a
guest of your own, the most polite thing for you to do is to decline
the invitation.
Dear Etiquetteer:
I live far away from my family now, but we still keep in touch. My
brother recently announced that he and his girlfriend are going to
get married next year; he’s asked me to be his best man, and
of course I said I would. The problem is this: the wedding is scheduled
for Memorial Day weekend next year, while a large engagement party
is being given at home on Labor Day weekend this year. I have a limited
amount of time off, as well as not much money, and don't want to travel
more than I must to celebrate their marriage. Am
I, as the best man, obligated to attend the engagement party?
Dear Urban Brother:
It's funny, isn’t
it, how brides and their grooms look at the calendar to schedule their
Big Day and say “Let’s get married on a three-day holiday
weekend so everyone will have an extra day to travel,” blithely
assuming that their friends and relatives want to spend a three-day
holiday weekend at their wedding instead of the beach. Because they
are our family or our friends, we forgive them and go anyway, and
pray that we’ll be seated at the table with the fun people.
But no couple,
no matter how dear, has any business requisitioning two consecutive
Memorial Day weekends from anyone. You may decline the invitation,
but since you are the best man and since the groom is your brother,
you should
do so with a beautiful letter welcoming his girlfriend into the family.
Etiquetteer suggests a nice gift as well (separate from the wedding
gift) as a gesture of goodwill and regret that you’ll miss the
party - perhaps a photo album in which they can put photos of their
lengthy engagement.
ETIQUETTEER, Encouraging Perfect Propriety in an Imperfect World
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Copyright 2002 by Robert B. Dimmick
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