The Delightful Chaos of TLC’s Four Weddings, #Bridechilla, & Baby’s First Botox
A chronic people pleaser walks down the aisle.
Hello there, woefully neglected followers–after a bout of Covid-19 (my first time), food poisoning from a questionable scallop, major surgery, and an entire quarter of zero posts, I’m back! Please excuse my absence.
I’ll get into the above at a later date; there’s a whole thesis to write on the loneliness and isolation of being ill and the way it warps your brain.
Since the last time we met, I got engaged! I have this long-standing joke with my now fiancé (I took French into my Freshman year of college) that my favorite emotion is being smug. Never mind that smugness is not an emotion and the clearly bad implications of dubbing “smugness” as your favorite emotion. But you would think that I’d be delighted to embrace the Bride™ of it all for the next year.
Turns out A. I’m being super chill about the entire affair and actually loving wedding planning and B., feeling guilty that I’m not being bride-y enough for my family, friends, and wedding party.
It’s very much like Katherine Heigl’s character Jane in 27 Dresses. A chronic people-pleaser, Jane is perfectly happy to upend her own life, cater to everyone else’s whims, and spend thousands of dollars on everyone else’s happiness essentially to be liked. She doesn’t rock the boat, she keeps calm and carries merrily along, she doesn’t want to put anyone out. I think as a bride now I’m straddling the line somewhere between loving being in control and feeling bad for not making a bigger deal out of everything.
But it’s like, if I control everything then I can’t let anyone down, no one can let me down, and perhaps most importantly in my lil’ bird brain, I can’t inconvenience or bother anyone. Example: I found the most amazing dress at BHLDN and my mom lives across the country so I ended up Facetiming her and it was awesome. But I didn’t even tell my bridal party the day I went. I made it a total non-event because I didn’t want to be a pill! If ever there is a time to even be remotely pill-ish it is trying on your wedding dress! Which requesting your best friend's presence at is not even pill-y!
As the eldest child bursting at the seams with neuroses and thus also being a capital C control freak it’s really hard for me to ask for help which once you’re engaged you quickly realize is something you need to get very comfortable with.
I’m writing this as a method of not only catharsis, but also to remind myself that I am a person of complexities and yes, neuroses, and I found an amazing, talented, deeply kind person that loves me not despite that, but because of it. But more paramount, is the realization that I need to love myself because of that too. I can be whatever the hell bride I want to be! No one is going to think I’m an asshole because I can’t do everything by myself. I think I just live in perpetual fear of both putting people out, which is cuckoo since virtually everyone I’ve ever met has offered assistance, and also loosening my grip because, naturally the sky would come falling down if I did so. Getting married makes you confront a lot of the baggage you’re holding onto. I’m so insanely lucky that none of it stems from kooky in-laws, dramatic parents, or an absent fiancé. But then, whoops, that means the call is coming from inside the house!!!
If you have issues asking for help or found yourself feeling like a deadbeat bride in some capacity I’d love to hear about it.
Dear TLC Execs, Bring Four Weddings Back Immediately
One thing I am doing as a bride is soaking up all bride-adjacent media. I’m rewatching wedding episodes of all my favorite TV shows, obsessively devouring #BrideTok, and indulging in bride-y reality TV, which quite frankly, we need more of!
Four Weddings, a long-gone TLC series from the early aughts has been on in the background pretty much all day, every day thanks to its seemingly endless amounts of episodes available on Discovery+. What is this highly binge-able show’s premise you ask? Four strangers attend each other's weddings (insane) and then judge! them (again, insane and in close proximity to my favorite emotion, smugness), and then those ratings are converted to points and the one with the highest score wins a honeymoon.
I like to watch this show for several reasons. There’s the Dollar Tree clearance aisle stock music they play over the reception scenes because they can’t clear music rights. There’s the nostalgia over the ghastly wedding trends of the 00s e.g. ball gowns with pickups, excessive bling, hot pink uplighting, etc. But mainly, it’s the schadenfreude of seeing these women complain and essentially downvote each other’s wedding over stuff like it being too windy during the ceremony (!!!) or seeing people have cash bars at their wedding and expecting to win the honeymoon, or how mashed potato bars were such a Thing from the years 2004-2014, and for some reason, the mashed potatoes were being served in martini glasses?
Anyway, Four Weddings, four stars.
Botox and Beyond!
I will likely get a smidgen of Botox before my wedding and would love to hear your thoughts if you’ve had it done before. I also decided 2023 is my Hot Year and I’m leaning in baby! Cya forehead wrinkles!
The Leftovers
Gays, I’m giving you until the time it takes to get to the end of this sentence to retire the term “GWYNNOCENT!” Annnnnd you’re done.
I am fascinated by the Hailey/Selena feud because if you couldn’t already tell I have brain worms. But mainly because Justin Bieber has said NOTHING publicly. Imagine you’re fighting for your actual life in the comments section and your man is nowhere to be found. Couldn’t be me!!!! But this is what happens when you marry a Pisces.
I recently returned from Mexico City which was unsurprisingly magical! Stay tuned for a mini guide on here and my IG @evapants.
Thanks for reading Fries for the Table! If you’d like to see more of me I can be found over @evapants on Instagram, and @literallE on Twitter. And drop me a comment! I’d love to chat about anything and everything.