Why weddings are the white plague of the 21st century

– Well, did you take it?

– I took it.

– And what, on the edges of the forget-me-not?

– Uh-uh…

– Small blue flowers with a yellow heart.

– Almost.

– Almost?!

Rather red flowers…

– Reds?!

– …Yes a bit. And … with a black core.

The connection is broken. I hope there is someone next to Maya who will pump her.

I’m standing in the middle of an uncomfortable abandoned building on the outskirts of Moscow, which could very well be a setting worthy of a horror movie. Above the nearest door is a sign reading “Caprice-Imprimer: We print the boldest whims”.

Obviously, two bored girls in front of the door are now sure that my most daring whim is A1 paper with painted pictures and the inscriptions “Uncle Kolya”, “Irisha”, “Oleg Ivanovich”, “Mother” and other names. I wish the drawing paper in my hands was an encrypted card pretending to be seated at a wedding banquet. But no – it’s just seats at the wedding banquet. Certainly, the words “marriage” and “only” should never be in the same sentence because of a complete, categorical and utter incompatibility.

Maya is getting married for the second time. The first time, she was 21 years old. The wedding was grand. For a banquet, they rented the Golden Ring restaurant (or, as the administrator respectfully called it, the Golden Ring) on ​​Smolenskaya Square and invited 228 guests – along with several bodyguards. Maya’s mother is a notary. And notaries in Moscow are serious people and also take such events as the marriage of children of other notaries seriously. As a result, there were several tables at Maya’s wedding, at which very serious people sat, and at the end of the wedding – very drunk people. Behind them stood unfazed wardrobes in jackets, muttering, “Valentin Petrovich, you’ve had enough.” I promised your wife. Let me drive you to the car. Please don’t bite my hand.”

Maya wore a dress for 123,000 rubles, and she was even allowed to call some of her classmates. In the context of all this splendor, it was kind of completely irrelevant who Maya was going to marry. And she married her classmate Fedya, whose superpower was that he could play computer games for 9 hours straight and never get up from the sofa to “pee”. And I didn’t invent it, it was he who boasted about it.

I don’t know why Maya decided to marry him, but I suspect it was a dress for 123,000 rubles. When it turned out that the dress could not be worn every day of married life, Maya divorced her. Now she is getting married for the second time.

“I want everything to be modest,” a friend told me right after her boyfriend’s proposal. – Only the closest friends, a couple of relatives. I will wear something simple. Maybe jeans.

But as the wedding day approached, the “closest friends” turned into “I still have to invite this bald man from the next department, otherwise it is inconvenient”, “a couple of relatives” into “Uncle Valentin with Aunt Tamara and five children will come specially from Novosibirsk”, and “even jeans” into “a dress on sale for only 75,000 rubles”. Not 123 thousand, but still.

And by the way, yes, if above all Maya wanted me because the closest bridesmaid was “to relax and have fun”, then a month before the wedding I rushed around Moscow, picking up invitations and sitting tables at the printing house, arguing with the photographer and convincing the florist to replace the carnations with buttercups without increasing the cost. I almost went crazy – it was time to increase the daily dose of vitamin B.

So here I am, sitting at Maya’s second wedding, which isn’t all that different from her first, watching my friend dance her first dance with her new husband. And I understand that it’s not me to blame her.

I myself fell into this nuptial trap during the first marriage. At first it seemed to me that we could manage with small forces. Especially for my first husband, it was the second marriage. I was sure that he and his parents had had enough of breaking glasses and tearing bread at their first marriage, and we would arrange everything easily, fashionably, youthfully. No matter how. When I told my grandmother that we were going to the registry office with two friends, she humbly replied:

“Of course, granddaughter. Only Valya and I will go to the registry office and watch you from afar. Valechka had never seen the bride!

The image of my grandmother and my five-year-old sister, cuddled together in the cold October wind, loomed before my eyes as my friends and I drank champagne. Well, where grandma is, there’s mom and dad.

– So your relatives will be at the wedding, but not mine? It won’t work! – the future ex-husband was offended.

As part of adding the wedding party, it seemed logical to book a table at a restaurant. And the day before the wedding, I got in trouble, and I asked for a red limo. And I booked a makeup artist! And this despite the fact that she had never painted before and never after.

Rubbing the third layer of foundation onto my cheeks, which had shrunk due to pre-wedding excitement, the makeup artist asked secularly:

– Is the apartment registered to you?

Trying not to move my lips, I breathed out, “Yes.” Certified makeup artist:

– It’s good. And then all of them are like silk before marriage, but when it comes to divorce, they will leave them bare buttocks.

I locked myself in the bathroom and took my makeup off before the makeup artist even left my assigned apartment. The most clumsily spent three thousand rubles in my life! It’s good that I didn’t do my hair – there wouldn’t be enough time to wash my hair. And the most clumsily spent thousand rubles in life would not be three, but all six.

Our marriage lasted five years. After his last breath, I was surprised to see the wedding photos taken by the photographer from the registry office with a giant vase of artificial flowers in the background. Why am I wearing such an unsuitable outfit for walking? Why do we need so many parents? Why, after all, did we use the services of a civil status photographer?

I reassured myself that this is the first marriage. Emotions begin to suffocate the brain, panic crowds out rational thought, and it already seems to you that you don’t feel sorry for money on this “most important day in a woman’s life.” Yes, the most important. It’s not even the first kiss. Not the first sexual intercourse. This is not the first episode of the series that we have watched together. Not an ordinary child’s birthday. It’s just the day the government office officials stamped your passports. And it is clearly not worth the super investment – moral and financial.

I remember after the divorce I decided that if I ever got involved in the wedding story again, the only luxury I would allow myself was a bridal bouquet. Passion as I love flowers. And I kept my promise.

True, I had to buy another dress to match the bouquet.

And shoes to match the dress.

And a little bow tie. For a cat.