Congratulations, you are engaged. Being engaged is a time where you and the love of your life (hopefully) dream together and make plans for the future. At the time, you are blissfully unaware at how unrealistic those plans and dreams are. It is like every time I think I want to get a dog. I love dogs, always have, and enjoy running into my friends Hooper, Hunter, and Mojo around town, but when I sit down and really think about getting a dog, I realize that I will be walking this dog, feeding this dog, and cleaning up after this dog. The dog will not be able to tell me when he has to throw up or when he has the runs and it will be all on me to take care of him. In theory, I would love to have a dog, but I would probably grow to resent it and have to give it away. Yes, I am comparing one of the happiest times in a couple’s life to making a decision about getting a dog. If the shoe fits…
One of the fun things to do when you get engaged is register. For those of you who live in a cave, to register means to go to a store, like Bed, Bath and Beyond, and pick out all sorts of things that you think you will need for your home and then people buy them for you as gifts. When I got engaged, I made husband #1 come with me to one of the stores and told him that he could pick whatever he wanted and, gasp, someone might buy it for us (little did we know that the folks from his side of the guest list don’t really care about what you want, but I digress). He chose a totally impractical lead crystal wine decanter. Aside from the fact that it was ugly and weighed about 75 pounds, the guy didn’t even drink wine and, surprisingly, after being married to me for almost 20 years, he still hasn’t taken up drinking (I, on the other hand…). Wouldn’t you know it, someone bought us the wine decanter. He was so excited and I, of course, returned it. Thus began our rose-petal-paved path to marriage.
I will admit, however, that he was not the only one who registered for a totally impractical gift. Since Bed, Bath wasn’t around when I was engaged, I registered at Tiffany’s. I chose a lovely ceramic salad bowl that was shaped like a lettuce leaf and six matching lettuce leaf-shaped mini bowls. Why did I do that? Because when we were to have company, I would give everyone a little salad bowl and they would take salad from the big bowl–all on our perfectly set table with frosted-glass water glass/wine glass/champagne flutes from Fortunoff’s (of blessed memory). Oh, and the set was close to $1,000.
Though my grandmother did buy the whole salad bowl set for me, I ended up returning it and now I have a lovely Tiffany’s pocketbook (yes, apparently Tiffany’s did make pocketbooks for a brief time in the ’90s). Epic fail. And someone did get me all of those glasses that I mentioned because when you register for glassware you don’t think that it will ever break and that the company will go out of business and you will only be down to nine water glasses (from 16), eight wine glasses (from 16), and all 16 champagne flutes because when do you ever serve champagne? Oh yes, in your imaginary daydream with the love of your life (still hopefully) during all of the fantastic parties you are going to have (because your kids are going to be perfectly behaved and be asleep every night by 7:30). I am hoping that since I still have all of the champagne flutes, perhaps there is still a party in my future (God willing, many parties…blah blah blah).
And then there was all of the Wilton Armetale stuff I registered for and people bought us…I am still not sure what this product was made out of. It was supposed to be oven-to-table, which you soon realize isn’t possible because table cloths burn (and so do the table pads under the tablecloths) and if you didn’t wash this stuff right away, the food left permanent marks on it. And in the garbage it went. Another kaporah…
So I propose to change the whole registry thing. I think engaged couples should be able to register for what they will really need in their beautiful lives together. I think you should be able to register for Xanax, vacations, housekeepers, personal chefs, and psychiatrists. I think registering for $250 glass platters should be illegal and I think there should be a therapist that takes you around the housewares department and whispers in your ear, “Go to Amazing Savings and use paper and plastic!” Just a thought…
Banji Ganchrow is a self-proclaimed writer who still uses the pitcher and glasses that her mother got her for a shower gift.
By Banji Latkin Ganchrow
