When I got engaged about two years ago, I was ecstatic, because *I do* authentically love my partner and was both astonished and flattered that she deemed messy, weird, me, worthy of a long-term commitment.
And of course, let’s get real, babe, getting engaged is a blast in a glass. You’ve got this sparkly new bling ring attached to your otherwise boring AF ring finger. You’re the girl of the moment. Champagne bottles are popped. Jealous-eyed sorority bitches approach you at work asking if they can see your ring. You’re suddenly very popular on Facebook. It’s all quite the dopamine rush!
In all truthfulness, I have the kind of brain makeup that enjoys a nice dopamine hit (I love clicks and likes and THANK YOU FOR YOUR ORDER flashes lighting up my static laptop screen after a reckless online purchase), so I loved those first few days where it felt like glasses were constantly being clinked together in cheers. I got a little high off the whole engagement circus while it lasted. (It’s fleeting, as it should be. Because let’s get real — you didn’t really accomplish anything by getting engaged. Love is, usually, dumb luck.)
But you know what knocked me right off the bride-to-be high horse, real fast? The condescending comments that kept flying out of the mouths of people who I would’ve never expected to have such dated views.
The ass-backward, archaic questions only got even stranger after marriage.
And because I’m your favorite misanthropic Lesbian Bride, I thought I would share these heinous questions with all of you!
“You’re probably going to want to slow down at work while you’re engaged.”
This was the first absolutely infuriating question I was asked post-engagement. I was having lunch somewhere annoying and expensive in Soho with a creative I collaborate with frequently when it went down.
“You know, Zara, I totally understand that you’re probably going to want to slow down on work while you’re engaged, right?” she asked me with dead-ass eyes.
“WHAT? WHY?” I spat out of a $4.00 sip of my $9.00 green juice.
My creative friend, let’s call her Swan Lake, squished up her un-Botoxed forehead in vehement frustration. “You’re planning a WEDDING,” she said. “It’s one of the most time-consuming things you can do.”
I began to laugh like a psychopath. “If you think I’m putting my career on hold to go to cake-tasting appointments, you’re high. I don’t even like cake.”
“That’s because you don’t eat carbs because you’re vain.”
She had a point. “True, but you get what I mean. I’m not going to slow down on the career I’ve been working on my entire life to pick out f*cking linens! I don’t give a f*ck about linens. I give a f*ck about scoring a top literary agent to help me sell my book.”
Swan Lake rolled her eyes like she didn’t believe me.
But the joke was on her. I did get that agent, and it took months of back-breaking work and revisions on my proposal and endless rejects. I also picked out linens, which took a total of three minutes.
“Bun in the oven happening soon?”
Oh, screw all the people (mostly men) who continue to ask me this question!
A bun with egg and cheese from the bodega on the corner is the only bun that’s happening soon for me.
FYI: Women don’t only get married because they plan on banging out a baby right away. Sometimes that’s the reason, sometimes it’s not. Either way, it’s none of your goddamn business. Sir.
“I’d say let’s stay out and do more shots, but your wife will kill me!”
Oh, because my wife owns me now? And somehow expects me to transform from being the girl who loves to stay out late taking shots and meeting new people, to a recluse who’s home in bed by 9 p.m. on a Saturday like a good little Mormon wife?
Look, if I’m turning down shots and refusing to stay out late, it’s because I have to work in the morning or want to preserve my energy for my creativity or don’t really like you all that much. Not because my wife will be pissed.
And if she was pissed, she’d be pissed at me. Not you, you narcissist. IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT YOU.
“It’s okay if you just want to be married, you know.”
I was on a phone meeting with a frequent freelance client right after my honeymoon (two days in Key West. Bitch had to get back to business!). We were discussing future projects when her voice became oddly sweet. We were talking business, and I prefer my business to be served straight-up — not sugar-coated.
“You know, if you want to take a step back and just be married for a while, that’s okay,” she said. I could smell the spoonful of honey sticky in her mouth.
“What does that mean?” I asked, trying my best to not let out my inner tri-state area mega-bitch. (I’ve lived in New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey, so the tri-state temper runs deep in my veins.)
“Like if you just want to be at home and be a wife for a while, that’s nothing to be ashamed of!” my client said, almost desperately. Like she was desperately holding on to the concept of stay-at-home wife.
“I know it’s nothing to be ashamed of. I respect women who want to do that, but I’ve actually never felt more inspired to work and be successful than I do right now,” I said, extra slowly as if I was talking to a small child. Because what I really wanted to say was “WOULD YOU ASK A DUDE THIS QUESTION, YOU SEXIST F*CKING BITCH?”
But I didn’t say that. Because like I said, I still want to work. And if you want to work and get paid (pay attention Gen Z), sometimes you just have to keep your mouth slammed shut.
“Is it okay if we have dinner just us? I love Meghan but I want to catch up with YOU.”
I know all of my friends are going to bitch me out for deeming this comment condescending in an essay without telling them in person, so I apologize. Married or not married, I’m still a f*ckgirl, what can I say?
I just detest this notion that when a woman gets married she must always do shit with her significant other. It makes me think of my dogs, who I walk with two attached leashes. It forces them to walk in unison, and they’re never able to venture far apart.
But I’m a girl, not a dog. The only leash I enjoy is one that’s used for kink purposes.
And while I love my wife with every fiber of my being, I want to get dinner without her too. And guess what? She probably doesn’t want to come and listen to us gossip about our high school friends or whether Rent The Runway is worth it or what we think of Jagged Little Pill the musical, either.
“Aww, you’re bickering like an old married couple!”
First off, my wife and I banter, we don’t bicker. It’s only been deemed “bickering” by our friends since we tied the knot (ew, did I just say “tie the knot”? Shoot me between the eyes please).
Second off, my wife is from the Bronx. I’m Manhattan-born and Long Island bred. We currently live in New Jersey. It’s in our culture to bust each other’s balls (yes, balls, tri-state natives are not precious) endlessly. We do it with not just with each other, but with our family and friends and the guy who works at the deli down the street too!
Plus, I didn’t just have 28 units of botox injected into my face to be called “old,” okay?
“That girl is so hot. Zara, I know you’re married, but if you weren’t, you would think this girl is hot.”
Guess what. I’m married and I still think that girl is hot. I think a lot of girls are hot. I’m married. Not blind.
What Do You Think?