Before I got engaged, one of my favorite pastimes was making fun of women who had just gotten engaged. They always seemed as though they believed they were embarking on the single-most-important event of their lives and, indeed, of anyone else’s life. They would so earnestly — and endlessly — discuss color schemes, dress-train lengths, reception locations, hors d’oeuvres, and guest favors that I thought my head might implode from the mindlessness of it all. As I listened to those brides wax obsessive about the minutiae that defines the modern wedding, I wondered what the world would be like if women everywhere channeled only a fraction of this collective talent, energy, and tactical acumen into running for political office. I never once thought to myself, "I will never behave like this if I get engaged." The possibility that I would ever resemble these neurotic creatures in any form was so ludicrous, so unthinkable, that renouncing their ways never even occurred to me.

You probably already know where I’m going with this. But let me explain one thing. Most women blame their wedding obsessions on the undue influence of all their giggly girlfriends. Once one of them gets a ring on her finger, she’s instantly surrounded and indoctrinated by the friends who believe that life before and after the wedding is meaningless, and that the only time one is truly alive is when one is wearing that big white dress. Before the hapless bride-to-be knows it, she’s spent her (or her parents’) income for the next decade, and she’s got 15 bridesmaids, all of whom must wear the exact same brand and shade of stockings on the big day or everything will be ruined.

I, on the other hand, am not surrounded by giggly girls. I am surrounded by vehement anti-brides. They’re all married. Not one of them bought a wedding dress from a bridal boutique. They didn’t sweat the minutiae, they didn’t fret about the menu, they didn’t freak about seating plans. They didn’t have violins, or limos, or lots of people in tuxedos. They lived full lives thinking about lots of other things, and when the time came, each one put on a dress (bought off the rack), walked down a nondenominational aisle toward a nontraditional officiant, announced (literally, in my friend Beth’s case), "Okay, I’m here. Let’s get married," and got married. After which they announced (literally, in my friend Gail’s case), "Okay, let’s drink." And then they drank. And it was good. They didn’t launch yearlong tactical exercises rivaled only by the preparations for D-Day. I have always admired my anti-bride friends.

When I got engaged, the unspoken assumption was that I would follow in their well-worn, screw-the-establishment footsteps — and I fully intended to. Of course, this fact is now moot, as I am up to my check-writing fingers in florists and violin duos and appetizers and bands and the most amazing wedding dress on earth (which I swore I was only going to try on at the bridal boutique). I don’t completely understand how it came to this, but I have a suspect: Andrew, my fiancé, whose taste in fine food, wine, clothing, and travel is surpassed only by his outstanding taste in women.

I knew I was in trouble when Andrew rejected our first potential reception location — one of the finest spaces in the city — because it looked "run down." I won’t blame all the subsequent decisions on him, but I will say that he set a certain standard that I felt obligated to maintain, and things just went crazy from there. Sure, we’re keeping to a budget, but it’s a much grander budget than I ever, in a million years, thought I would spend on a party that will last a sum total of six hours. We’re doing all the wedding things I’d vowed I would not do. Worst of all, we’re having an absolute blast doing them. I am wracked with guilt. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

I have been so ashamed of being a big, fat, boutique-dress-buying, seating-plan-making, black-tie-wedding-having hypocrite that, up until last month, I hid the details of my wedding from the anti-brides. Then, last weekend, I met them all face to face. In a moment of champagne-induced poor judgment, I shared a few basic details. That was enough. The following conversation ensued:

Friend #1: (makes strange sucking sound with her mouth)

Friend #2: "What’s that?"

Friend #3: "Oh, that’s just the sound of Kris getting sucked into the spinning bridal vortex."

Friends (in unison): "HA HA HA HA HA HA."

Me: "Shut up."

I’m thinking I’ll keep my mouth closed from here on out. The anti-brides will learn everything they need to know about the wedding on my wedding day, and not before. Maybe I’ll find a solitary bargain I can brag about between now and then. Maybe I’ll buy my bridal shoes at Payless, or wash my hair with Suave shampoo on my wedding morning. But I’ll tell you one thing. They’d better all be wearing coordinated stockings that day, or heads will roll.

Kris Frieswick can be reached at k.frieswick@verizon.net