I feel like I must be crazy, that I must have some wrong schema. Planning this wedding is making me tense and unhappy. I was crying in rush hour traffic last night, just distressed about spending so much money and so much of my parents' money on something that isn't coming together to be what I want. And even if it were easy, it's still a stupid amount of money to spend on a party, when it could make an excellent down payment on a house in a softening housing market. And that feeling is exacerbated by the feeling that it is all for other people's benefit.

This won't change me and Jon. It will enable other people to see us as married, to accept our moral choices without feeling affronted, to tax us more, to feel we're entitled to health and life insurance benefits.

And I don't know if people are making small talk, or if they think they're being helpful, or if they're just trying to feel superior when they ask, "Do you have such-and-such task done? Oooh, isn't it a little late?"

The bridal magazines would have me believe I'm a freak. But I've learned not to believe what the advertisers are trying to tell me. So, is it possible that I'm not the only girl who hates this wedding planning?

I would get out of it if I thought there were any way I could.