tea and cake or death

Turning 25 seemed like good idea at the time. It was kind of quiet and unassuming but it still had an appropriately noteworthy feel. I shed the hefty naivete of my early 20s and settled comfortably into the ... slightly less hefty naivete of my mid-20s. It was, as far as birthdays go, not bad.

But no one ever tells you the dark side of 25. Because everyone's too excited about your brand-new eligibility for the Hertz #1 Club to bother to point out that for the next five to ten years of your life, your summers and your finances are officially fucked. Because you've entered the zone - the wedding zone - when everyone you have ever known will give up and in and decide to make it official.

And chances are you're invited.

My wedding season, appropriately enough, kicks off over Memorial Day weekend, which means that the pre-party to-dos have been ongoing for a few weeks now. This past Saturday I attended a bridal shower for a friend who's getting hitched in June (wedding #2, six days after wedding #1). The shower was uncommonly nice as mandatory social occasions go: swift, fun, pretty. We sat outside and drank tea and champagne and commiserated about the absolute impossibility of relying on the F-train on a weekend. I also ate half my weight in mini-quiche.

I had never actually been to a proper shower before, so I was moderately concerned that I was going to be coerced into one of those shower games, like The Apron Game or Toilet Paper Bride. Or Tacks on the Hot Dog. (Um, and why do we have these games again? I get that occasionally a group of adults can't be trusted to socialize with one another, but that's why God invented alcohol. Is the entire wedding process just not quite infantalizing enough without pornographic pin the tail on the donkey? It's almost enough to make a girl long for the day when men would just club you over the head and drag you into the nearest cave.) Luckily for me, though, the bridesmaids in charge of the shower erred on the side of not-evil, and the event was blessedly free of excruciating game-play.

Well, mostly free, that is. We did participate in one group activity, where each guest had to take a card and scribble down a few keepsake words of wisdom for the bride-to-be. Things like "Remember you're a team: even when you fight you're still on the same side." Supportive things. Grown-up things. Things you might see crocheted on a pot holder.

Now, I'm a little unclear about the verifiable long-term psychological effects of divorce. I'm sure I'm probably supposed to be, like, scarred or whatever it's called these days. Bad at the relationships or something. Which, yeah, I totally am, but for reasons that have less to do with my personal history than my persistent, obnoxious misanthropy.

That's what I tell myself, anyway - I'm sure a therapist would say differently.

(Which is probably why I refuse to consider therapy.)

And there are probably other effects, too, but I've never bothered looking into it. I vaguely recall some intellectual blowhard suggesting that kids with divorced parents couldn't appreciate great literature, but I only remember this because I was so appalled by the suggestion. (Although, in retrospect, he may have been right - at least in my case. After all, no one who really appreciates great literature would be so perverse as to work on the business side of publishing. That would be like Julia Child lobbying for a gig as a manager at Applebee's.)

But I am pretty sure of one thing: kids who grew up in an environment of dysfunctional parental interaction are going to be total crap when it comes to matrimonial advice.

Because after many minutes of careful consideration, this was the best I could come up with: "Always laugh at each other. Except when you can't. And then watch Eddie Izzard."

It wasn't until much later that I realized what I should have written: "When in doubt, don't hesitate to ask for advice. Just don't expect much from your 25-year-old fuckwit friends."

Maybe by the time I'm 26 I'll actually have something useful to contribute.

Somehow, though, I doubt it.