All In the Terminology
Something that's been niggling away in the back of my mind suddenly crystalised into a simple realisation when I was reading My Beloved's latest comment on his own blog. I've been trying to work out what it is in everyday conversations that's felt off, and now i know.
It's that at some point, without consciously choosing to do it, we started referring to the event that will be happening in a little under three weeks as 'the wedding', and to concepts such as the wedding rings and the wedding outfits in the same way. And I'm a bit pissed off with myself for that.
I took a very hard line in the early days - we're not getting married, because we're not legally allowed to get married, so I shall stand my ground and not refer to it as a wedding. A lot of the decisions around the trappings of the day were predicated upon this fact. We don't have to have a ceremony, so we won't. We don't have to have a formal 'reception', so we won't. We'll have a Civil Partnership party and that'll be the end of it.
But it's just easier to say 'wedding'. People know what you mean. It makes organising things easier if you say to people "It's for a wedding" when you ask about things. It makes them ten times more expensive too, but that's just the way of the world. Everyone else says 'wedding' anyway, (except Registrars, who've clearly had it impressed upon them that they never ever should) so beyond a certain point you just feel like you're fighting the tide.
And if I'm completely honest, I don't think of them as Civil Partnership Rings. And I don't think of it as getting Civilly Partnered. I think of them as Wedding Rings. And in my head we're getting Married.
But I do feel weak for giving in 