Tuesday, April 29, 2003 :::
 
The Winning Entries.
How to Protect Yourself From Your Parents. This was the stunning headline on a recent article in the Personal Journal section of the WSJ. It wasn't advice for kids whose moms slap them too hard. It was advice for financially independent adults whose parents need them. The advice offered was sound--plan ahead--but the tone smacks of the whiny '60's generation complaint that they are "the sandwich generation:" just as their kids grow up and leave home, their own parents begin to slow down and need some attention. This is viewed as an enormous burden by the Selfish Generation, which it is, but the rest of the world calls it "life."

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The gander dishes sauce onto the goose. A Mind That Suits sees a lot of weddings. He has long since concluded that weddings are like old age: they amplify whatever is already there. Happy families have happy wedding receptions, unhappy families turn them into yet one more battle in a protracted war.

The incredible wealth of most Americans has only made this more true. If you read the novels of Jane Austin, you will see that even in the heights of English society 200 years ago, the groom's family simply went over to the bride's family's house, they rode to the church together, and then they all came back for dinner. The nannies who raised the young couple probably went along. 25 guests tops.

No longer. Weddings get more and more elaborate, more and more complicated, thus offering many more opportunities for serious fights among the female members of the bride's family, with the women on the groom's side occasionally joining in for fun. People in the wedding business are very good at coming up with new accessories essential for "the perfect wedding," and all too many women are willing to take the bait. The "wedding industry" now takes in $50 billion a year.

This has coincided with the growth of the notion that the purpose of life is "personal fulfillment," however one defines it, so one should scrap for every piece of territory one can. Carl Rogers was the psychologist who really crystallized the self-help philosophy into a handy weapon for terrorizing those around you. He even called one of his books Personal Power. So much for the simple sacrifices and compromises that make life together possible and truly fulfilling.

You can imagine what the weddings of two people into "personal power" can turn into.

You will have noticed the shift from the initial emphasis on women to the "two people." The indispensible Miss Manners, years ago, once told an anxious young groom that his only job was to show up, on time, properly dressed, as weddings were a female concern. A Mind That Suits even knows a younger man who married into real wealth. His only task was to say "I do" during a full weekend of activities involving 700 guests. (A Mind That Suits pauses to wonder, for the millionth time since meeting this man at another friend's much simpler wedding, how one can possibly know 700 people well enough to invite them to your wedding.)

Things are changing. The Journal had a lengthy article recently on how actively involved men are now getting in their own nuptials. Partly this is just a result of professionals' marrying later and paying for their own weddings, but some of what was described clearly falls under the rubric of "personal power." One man wanted tulips when his bride wanted roses. Feelings ran high enough that they really fought over it and compromised on calla lillies, which are beautiful, but not what either of them really wanted in the first place. It may be a natural development, given the way we do things these days, but A Mind That Suits--who is not married--would like to suggest that this is not a good way to start off what is, by all accounts, the most important year of the marriage.

A Mind That Suits happens to know that calla lillies are more expensive than either roses or tulips. The wedding industry smells a doubling of profits, or at least a large increase, and is pouring gas on the flames by rushing in to give the groom ideas for things to demand. Make capitalism another thing that merely amplifies what is already there.

A "comments" section is at this point not available. However, e-mails are happily received at:
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So much for the old stuff. Read on, new visitors...


::: posted by A Mind That Suits at 11:03 AM


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What doesn't kill me, makes me laugh... usually.