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Scheduling your wedding on a Saturday in the fall is your right as an American. You are more than free to carry out this plan, but you must do so at your own peril, as you will surely encounter a few disgruntled guests on your “thanks for coming” table-to-table reception tour.
In this week’s Mailbag edition (is this a PGP first?), we hear from a distraught college football fan whose friend scheduled his wedding on a Saturday in the fall, and he is invited — even worse, this particular Saturday in the fall is also the date of the Alabama-Tennessee game in Knoxville. Our emailer is a Tennessee fan.
His email is below.
Hey douchebag,
My high school friend just announced his wedding date. It just so happens he and his fiancé chose October 15th, otherwise known as the 3rd Saturday in October, otherwise known as the Tennessee Bama game. I am born and bred in Tennessee, went to high school in Tennessee, and the same can be said for all of my friends invited to this wedding (and the groom). My friends and I have been planning our trip to Knoxville for the game for the last three months. Am I crazy or does the have to be the work of the fiancé? There has to be a written rule somewhere against having a wedding in the fall, let alone on the day of what could be the biggest football game of the last decade in the state of Tennessee. Not only that, the wedding is scheduled in the afternoon, which if its a prime time game there’s no way I’d see any of it.
With all that being said. This friend and I are friends but not that close. We got to know each other at the end of high school and we talk maybe twice a year if that.
Is it completely of of base of me to say me and my buddies should just buy him a nice gift and still go the game?
Life tip:
Fiancé = male who is engaged.
Fiancée = female who is engaged.
File that rule away so next time you don’t imply your boy is marrying a guy, not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Now to the dilemma. This is a recurring debate every fall for people in the “my friends are marrying age” demographic. I’ve put some thought into it and I believe I have a solid take. It comes down to this: Your friend knows what he’s doing, and choosing to schedule his wedding on a fall Saturday means that he has knowingly forfeited your attendance obligation. Where you fall on the friend scale can nullify this rule, however. We’ll discuss that later.
I equate a fall wedding to planning a destination wedding, actually. Let’s think about what it takes to attend a wedding in the town in which you live versus all that goes into attending an out-of-state or out-of-country destination wedding.
If all you have to do is shave and throw on your monkey suit to go to a buddy’s wedding in your town, you’re obligated to go. You have to go. Further, if someone plans a wedding in the town in which he or she grew up — it is to be assumed this is the hub of their friends and family members — this person is expecting the largest possible contingent of attendees. They want you there. They want everyone there. You’re expected to be there, and the guest book will be checked off.
A destination wedding is so different, though. If your friend plans his wedding in the Riviera Maya, for example, and you receive an invitation, you are not obligated to go. Think about all that is required to make that trip: You have to ask off from work, use valuable PTO, and you have to come out of pocket a grand at minimum, sometimes two or even three if you’re bringing a plus one. They want you to go, but you’re not obligated to go. That’s the important thing to remember. It’s a major commitment from you and they know this.
Having your wedding during a college football game, especially when Bama comes to town, adds an implied parenthetical at the bottom of the invitation that reads: I get it. You don’t have to come.
Now if this friend is a “close” friend or better, you have to miss the game. Or you could simply lose the friend, and honestly that’s not the worst decision..
Respond
Dillon Cheverere
Dillon Cheverere is the Vice President of Media for Grandex, Inc. Email: dillon@grandex.co
@dcheverere
@dcheverere
RogerJDorn
If your buddy is marrying a woman with this much control over him, you’ll never see him again anyways so attendance doesn’t matter.
She definitely seems like she might be the spawn of satan tbqh
He is probably doing you a favor by offering you a chance to miss the child abuse that Bama will inflict on the Vols
What are you talking about? It’ll be a great game like Bama and USC…oh.
I’m ready for the downvotes, but…it’s a football game,man. If dude is a real friend, you go.
This is always seems like a really silly question to me. I like football, but weddings are a blast.
Exactly. I think I have been lucky in that I have yet to attend a “bad” wedding. But unless it was tickets to a national championship or the Super Bowl, I’m going wedding every time.
Went to a wedding this past weekend outside in Texas, at a ranch with no service at all. I couldn’t even check the box scores. At least I was sweating the whole time.
I have one this weekend, it’s nice that it is nearly fall so in TX that means it’s only going to be 95 degrees…
We got married in the fall and chose my alma mater’s bye weekend. That’s the only acceptable way to have a fall wedding. Then the wedding party went to the Saints game the next day.
I feel like I can add some valuable advice here having just planned and executed my own wedding.
A.) First of all, fall weddings are a no go and that is just common courtesy. Mine was July.
B.) Secondly, there were a lot of people who couldn’t make the wedding and a fair amount were friends. Guess what? Nobody cared. The wedding was still awesome and we had a great time. It didn’t matter that some friends couldn’t make it. I totally understood and I expected it. So this guy is probably expecting a fair amount of people not to go and its not going to hurt his feelings if you don’t show up, especially if y’all aren’t that close. For what its worth, I’ve skipped a wedding in favor of football and ACL and it was definitely the right call.
If you’re a groomsman though?…sorry bud. Gotta go.
Why is not having a fall wedding common courtesy? I have yet to get married but as an attendee who sweats a lot, I prefer a fall wedding.
A/C my dude. No outdoor weddings. That is common courtesy number 2
I will ride with you on no outdoor weddings. You have to be insane to rely on the weather to no be shitty (especially in the Midwest). But really not having a fall wedding is a preference rather than a common courtesy. I’m done arguing semantics now.
What about a fall wedding during week 2? There were shit games week 2 this year and most years if I’m not mistaken.
Can we get a time stamp on this e-mail? If the dude just found out less than a month before that the wedding is the 15th then he has no obligation to go, especially if he has been planning a trip to this game for 3 months.
I’m really surprised more people haven’t brought this up. Based on the email it sounds like the couple announced their wedding date three months in advance of the actual date? Holy shit, what kind of god-awful planning is that? No one with prior plans should be obligated to go.
Correction: One month before the actual date…even worse than I originally thought.
I’m not sure how the dates run in Tennessee, but the start of several different hunting seasons is what pushes me over the edge with fall weddings
We’re going to lose anyway so you’re going to be disappointed anyway.
Either way.
As someone who is currently planning a wedding, for fall of 2017, I am fully aware that I have family members who will miss my wedding if there is a Clemson home game that weekend. Currently I am praying to the football gods that it is an away game so that people are not upset, but as the ACC doesn’t give out the full schedule until the spring, planning around football season becomes a waiting game. And while I realize it would make sense to do it earlier, extenuating circumstances are preventing that.
All that being said, you can be guaranteed that we will have a projector showing the Clemson game at the reception should it be at the same time. Sometimes you have to do it in the fall, but you have to take the consequences that come with it.
(Unless I can finally convince my fiancé to elope. Still working on that one)