The Feminist Bride: The Ring

I am not a Gollumn- but it when it came to thinking about a ring, I became just as bad as any of the creatures in Lord of the Rings. It was an instant case of my precious.

When I decided to ask my boyfriend to marry me, I did what any man would have done- I went out and got a ring. I found one that fit within my ethical framework. It hand crafted by a local craftsperson from metals I could stand behind. It was beautiful, practical, symbolic, and it wasn't going to cost us our first born child. I did what I would have wanted someone to do for me- at least that's what I thought.

Once I my proposal was accepted, I did what any bride to be would have done- I began to tell people about our engagement. I told everyone I could think of that we were engaged, and there first question was always- can I see the ring?


Now- if you recall, I proposed. I got him the ring. So every time I was confronted with the question- can I see your ring- I had the same obvious answer- I don't have one. For the first week I felt fine about my bare naked ring finger. I was a feminist- and I was standing up for female proposers everywhere- why did I need a ring?, I thought.
But as Christmas started to loom, and the onslaught of holiday family pressure mounted- I began to panic.

Questions like What will the relatives think? and Will they judge my new fiance because he didn't get me a ring? began to ring in my ears. And so, with a week to spare before Christmas eve, my partner (probably sensitive to my distress) handed me his mother's sweet-16 ring, which, mind you, had a very small, but noticeable diamond. In giving me this ring, it was not a gesture of- this ring is going to be your wedding ring, it was more of a- wear this and see if you like it- or a- I had this in a drawer and thought you might want to wear it type of gesture.

And- I was grateful. I slipped the slightly too large ring with the slightly too small diamond onto my finger. Relief was noticeable. So was the fact that the ring was too big. So, in order to beef up the amount of metal on my finger, and to keep his mothers ring from slipping from my slender fingers, I added my grandmother's gold wedding band for good measure. With a sweet sixteen ring from the 60s and a wedding band from another wedding on my ring finger, I marched into the Christmas cocktail parties.

However, my input subsitutionism only made matters worse. I was stuck explaining the small diamond and the wedding band from another wedding (as if a small diamond or a grandmother's wedding band were something to be ashamed of). And, to make matters worse, people who hadn't seen me, assumed I was already married, as I was double banded. At every turn I was confronted with the social expectation of what I should have on my finger- and from experience, De Beers has done an excellent job of convincing every American, that if you don't have a big new diamond on your finger- your engagement should be questioned.

After enough comments and enough cocktail parties, even I began to question myself. Thoughts like- I should just go out and buy myself a diamond- began to appear in my head. By the end of the holidays, I was compulsively googling diamond rings and trying to figure out how I could justify the purchase of such a rock to the ethical part of my brain.

Come the New Year, I was so exhausted by the whole ring diamond thought train, I was ready to give up. When a thought occurred to me. Why don't I just ask my new fiance to get me a ring?

Honestly, since I was the one who proposed, I thought I wouldn't get a ring until we were married. I mean, the guy doesn't ever get a ring until the wedding. However, when I proposed I clearly had NO idea of how deep the cultural expectations of engagement rings are in this country.

When I finally told my fiance that I couldn't take it anymore, and asked if he could buy me a ring- he laughed. I think he jokingly said something like you were such a feminist, so hardcore, and now look at you before hugging me and saying of course. My dry reply was probably something like being a feminist means be able to determine when you want to acquiesce to cultural norms. 

So he got me a ring. We went back to the house of the ring maker who made his ring, and now I have a matching band, made out of the same piece of metal- and when I slipped it on, I knew I had made the right choice.

The Feminist Bride: A bride to be

In the two months following my proposal, I have learned enough about the American wedding phenomenon to last me two lifetimes. With luck, this is the first, last, and only time I'll need to be a bride-to-be.

For those of you who haven't had the good fortune to become a bride in training, the psychology runs deep. Social training begins at a young age. The expectation of the proposal, the engagement, the ring, the dress etc, are all set before the story begins. Indeed, now that I'm a bride-to-be, I'm swimming in the expectations I've created and been coerced into over a lifetime.

Alongside many latent psuedo-protestant christian values (to be discussed later), my mind has been taken over by a deadly trilogy of societal norms. It is a lethal cocktail of one part Disney heroines, one part Martha Stewart, and one part 1950s Betty Crocker house wife fantasy.

Since becoming a bride-to-be, I have begun to dream of dresses that look like badly iced cupcakes, a million and one ways to gussy up ball jars, and the inescapable wedding registry gift: a brightly colored Kitchen-Aid mixer.

Since when did I want to wear something that was so ruffly I feel like I'm swimming in a pool of whipped cream? Or turn a thousand ball jars into a wedding alter? Or acquire a kitchen implement that is so heavy no one in gods name wants to pull it out of the closet?

Answer: Since the American wedding industry crept into my head and stole my brain. Out with my well formulated counter-cultural values- in with the dreams of an American girl so steeped in the wedding phenomenon she has forgotten who she really is.

Stay tuned for more adventures of The Feminist Bride and the search for a meaningful wedding.

The Feminist Bride: Engagement

I'm a 28 year old white, upper-middle class American female, trained by Walt Disney and Cosmo and Seventeen Magazine. Since I have been able to understand what a wedding was, I have fantasized about how the man would propose. Where it would happen, how he would kneel, how I would act surprised but shyly confident beneath my blush. As a feminist I suppose I should be embarrassed about these confessions, but when it comes down to it, fantasies of this type are common. I am not at all different than any other woman I know. I don't know another woman my age who hasn't envisioned how her engagement would transpire. Ready to say yes or shake her head in reply.

Before I decided that I was ready to marry I hadn't the slightest idea of how deep my pre-conceptions of engagement were. It was not until I decided I was ready to wed that I discovered how thoroughly my expectations (and everyone else around me) were already imbedded in my American cultural soul.

Six weeks ago I flipped my socio-cultural norms on their head. I kneeled down on a beach in California, and asked my boyfriend for his hand in marriage. 

Since that day I have come to understand that engagement is actually the last bastion of cultural misogyny.

A personal example: How many women in your life do you know who asked their partners to marry them?

Lesbians aside, your answer should be apparent. We are few.

And why- is it that it's difficult to be the one who asks? Is it that we are too weak or indecisive to execute? Is it because we don't know his ring size? No. No. and No. The only reason we as women allow ourselves to continue the gender biased process of a traditional engagement is because society hasn't let this last stand go.

True discrimination happens when something is so ingrained in society that no one notices it. Indeed, I myself hadn't realized I too expected the man to propose until when cleaning the house a few years ago, my boyfriend approached me (then on a ladder 8 ft in the air, in my filthiest clothes, hair full of cobwebs) with a small blue velvet ring box. My mind immediately jumped to Oh No! Not Here! He can't propose to me like this! It was at that moment I realized my assumptions. I had never stopped to consider that I might be the one to pop the question.

Similarly, it occurred to very few of our friends that in our case, my proposal was the perfect and most logical way for this to transpire. He had already told everyone he was ready to marry- he was just waiting for me. So when I became ready- I had to reevaluate my position on engagement. It didn't make much sense for me to tell him that I was ready, and for him subsequently to propose- where's the mystery, the magic, and the surprise in that?

So I set to planning. I created my fantasy of a proposal. There was a beach, a sunset, a hand crafted ring from a local artisan.  And in the end, my proposal was accepted, and heartily I might add. It didn't faze him in the least that I had been the one to ask. I'm adding the comfortability with flipped gender norms to the many reasons I'm grateful for my groom to be.

And to all you ladies out there- here's an encouragement: Proposing was one of the most empowering actions I've ever taken. And, as a bonus, I got to create the proposal that I had always dreamed of.