To Have and To Hold Onto

I know it'll sound like a cliche, the way celebrity stunners always cluck about their ugly duckling teen years, but I've never been one of those girls who spends a lot of time fantasizing about my wedding day. I haven't logged a zillion page views on The Knot, secretly cast my bridal party, and I can't tick off the various cuts of diamond engagement rings, in fact I had to be convinced by a friend that it isn't abusive to expect my future one-and-only to stash three months' of his hard-earned salary to buy me an icy ring.

Why not put that toward a reception for our families, particularly my vast extended? Or the down payment on our Brooklyn apartment? Why not even toward the furnishings, eliminating the need for a guest-funded registry. I basically thumbed my nose at bridal magazines, in favor of the $385 silk faille numbers from J.Crew.

My theory has been that practicality and self-sacrifice in wedding makes for endurance in marriage, like carbo-loading before a marathon instead of gorging on junk. Look at my maternal and paternal grandparents who were so exemplary, I thought - married, smart, and playful into their golden years and seemingly perfectly meshed and matched - and none had Four Seasons affairs. Just Supermen who'd found Superwomen.

But this doesn't mean that I haven't spent time dwelling on my future marriage. And with my friend G's wedding to her great hubby-to-be set to unfold in just a few hours on the Lower East Side, the subject is at the front today.

Like most people I've had the benefit of watching several, varied unions play themselves out over the course of my growing up. Some of them unfortunately flawed to the point of dysfunction, but nearly all I suppose, entered into through the same swarm of butterflies and uncooked rice that mark newly taken vows.

So along the way, I've tried to figure out what dooms some couplings. If only they'd focused on what was important, on connecting. My unconventional thinking had it that Bloomberg's spruced-up City Hall marriage bureau could be just as memorable, and maybe even imbue the proceedings with the necessary seriousness.

But in truth, there's no vaccine against a faltering marriage, no shots to take, no potions to imbibe. You watch your parents and build toward or against their blueprint. And the details matter less to me now: A 21-gun salute or 21 of your nearest and dearest, as long as there's love in the air. ... The secret to something enduring lies elsewhere. In the meantime, I'm very happily tossing rice.