ExposedNYC

After conversations with girlfriends across the country, I decided to declare this week as officially disastrous for single women everywhere. It began with Jodie, who thought she would attend an uneventful family wedding as a guest. She was already dreading the event because her on-again, off-again “refuses-to-use-the-term-boyfriend-even-though-we-spend-every-day-together” guy decided he wasn’t feeling up to it so she was going alone.

Upon walking in the door she was blindsided with another surprise. Surprised at the emptiness of the venue, she was sent to assist the bride, her cousin, in getting dressed. Before her hands could even finish pulling the zipper to the top of the seam, they were shoved around a bouquet and it was at this moment that she was informed she would be walking down the aisle and acting as maid-of-honor. She glanced down at her dressy slacks and cute top and immediately cursed dressing without the knowledge of walking down the catwalk aisle.

But this was family, so what do you do? She smiled through the ceremony, signed the marriage certificate and headed off to the reception thinking that it couldn’t get any worse- until the bouquet toss.

*Tangent*
I don’t know if it’s because I’m becoming one of the last single women among many groups of friends, if it’s my feminist leanings but this tradition just seems like a worse and worse idea the older I get. My first disappointment was at eight years old when I caught the bouquet at one of my mom’s best friend’s weddings and was made to give it away because I didn’t understand the significance. I chose the prettiest girl in the room, begrudgingly handed it off, and proceeded to pout the rest of the evening. I have a theory that from that day I’ve been cursed, and maybe that lady married the older man of my dreams. I’ve since gravitated towards avoiding the fiasco when it is invoked and thanking brides when they choose not to include it as part of the festivities. Although, there are times during the garter toss when I think it would be fun to crowd surf among the corralled single men… but even then many are not really “single” but dating women who force them onto the floor in hope of a clear sign that it’s time to take the final plunge. Anyway, I digress, back to Jodie.

She found herself in the unfortunate situation of being the only single woman at the reception. Now, at this point you would think the couple would be kind and not draw attention to the point. Instead, she was called to the middle of the floor and publicly presented with a bouquet filled of antiquated expectations: “a girl must want to get married, and just needs a little luck, and pretty flowers, to propel her towards settling down with the right man.”

Jodie called me from the car on the way home, slightly mortified and looking for moral support. She was in the Jack in the Box drive thru line picking up dinner for the hopeless man too tired to escort her, but who somehow realized, when Sunday Night Football ended and his stomach began to growl, that he couldn’t go a day without seeing her. As she tossed the bag of chicken sandwiches next to the wilting flowers on the seat beside her, I just hoped by the end of the evening that both would end up tossed into the garbage where they belong- along with the pressure to make a lifelong commitment before being good and ready.

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