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Of course, people at work know I’m engaged. I wear a diamond ring on my left hand, but no wedding band, and if I ever talk about PDog, I refer to him as “my fiance.” I would just call him by his first name, but I have a coworker of the same name, so it gets confusing. (Side note: I HATE the term “fiance,” because it seems like I’m trying to bring up wedding planning. I usually avoid talking about him at all. To compensate, I talk about my dog ad nauseam. No one is surprised.)
But I won’t bring up my wedding planning, and if I am asked about it, I won’t go into detail. For starters, I like to keep work life and personal life separate.
There’s a bigger reason, though.
I work in an extremely cerebral environment. I’m in meetings with people who are intimidatingly studied and well-spoken. And there is a fairly stark age difference—I am the youngest person by a good twenty years. I appreciate that my coworkers take me seriously, and I don’t want to do anything to remind them of my young age or relative inexperience. I’m sure people would be great about it if I did choose to introduce my wedding plans into conversation, but it’s not the right choice for me. Is this over-analytical on my part? Maybe. But it works for my comfort level.
Well, I guess there’s one person I talk about it with. She’s around my age and works in my department, but she’s not a colleague who’s involved in my daily work. And it’s nice to have that one person. A few weeks ago, she ducked in to show me her wedding invitations (gorgeous), and it was nice to have a little giddy, brides-to-be moment at work.
If people ask about wedding planning, that’s great. It’s polite office talk, and it usually goes like this:
Coworker: By the way, how’s wedding planning?
Me: Oh, it’s going well, thank you.
Coworker: How soon is it?
Me: Not ’til May.
Coworker: Oh, so you have plenty of time.
Me: Yep!
/end scene
But last week, it went like this:
Coworker: How soon is it?
Me: Not ’til May.
Coworker: Oh! So that’s soon!
Me: Yep! Wait. What?! Oh, I guess it is soon. Wow, um…(cue nervous laughter, internalized freak-out.)
It took a relative stranger noting that my wedding is soon for it to sink in. For the rest of the afternoon, I was completely overwhelmed that we’re getting married in three months. (I’ve been a little busy lately; guess it slipped past me.)
So I keep reminding myself: all of the basics are taken care of (except invitations, which are in-progress). Regardless of what details we complete, a wedding WILL take place. And I will be there. (So will Pdog. Probably. I don’t know; I was pretty annoying this weekend.)
That’s two questions for you:
1) Do you talk about your wedding at work?
2) Did the soon-ness of your wedding sneak up on you? Did you emotionally eat your body weight in onion rings over the weekend to silence the reverberating panic? No? Just me?
I think we get so involved with the planning, and other aspects of life, that once those short-term goals we set are accomplished it becomes suprising to discover several weeks or even months have passed. Mister and I have been married 4 months now and I still can’t believe how quickly the wedding arrived - and ended.
I work for a really small company so I couldn’t help telling them when I got engaged. My problem is that many of my coworkers are assuming that they’re invited! Eek!
I probably bore my poor cubemate to tears with wedding talk… I’m also in an office full of 20-somethings who are always pregnant or getting married or meeting new boyfriends so it’s normal conversation. I’ll be moving to a new department in a couple of months and interested to see how different things will be once I’m elsewhere.
I’ve just started a new job, so most people don’t know - my supervisor was quick to spot the e-ring, but the majority of the staff are in the dark. Once I get settled and get to know everyone better, I’m sure people will ask questions - it’s March now, not that far away!
I work with a rather large group of women from their mid-20s to mid-40s…all we EVER talk about are weddings and babies. At any given moment someone is usually engaged/on their homeymoon or pregnant/on maternity leave. I feel sorry for the 3-4 guys who work here 
EEK! I had no idea using the word “fiance” meant you were trying to bring up wedding planning! I just think it’s a fun (and funny) word to say and love to use it because I’m only going to have a fiance for 11 months… gonna have to cut that one out if that’s seriously the perception of the word!
I’m glad I’m not the only one who dislikes saying “fiance”! It feels like I’m either bragging (when talking to single friends) or trying to bring up my wedding (like you mentioned). I avoid it except when necessary!
I’m in academia, as a grad student and employee, so a similarly cerebral work environment, though there are other people my age around (I’m also 24).
So imagine my surprise, being recently engaged, that people in my department DO NOT STOP wanting to talk wedding-y things. I’m not even really planning yet! Aaah! …yeah, I feel a little weird about it.
For the record, I always feel totally pretentious when I say “my fiance”. I usually gloss over the whole situation by calling Mr. Lox by name.
When out and about, if I need a title for him quickly, I’ve been known to say “my husband” just to make things simpler. (For instance, when I called a store to get answers on a repair order he’d put in? I was totally his wife for those 5 minutes. Ooops.)
I talk about the wedding at work, but not in any great detail. Sometimes co-workers ask, and sometimes it up (ie- we had a food tasting recently and I shared a few details), but it is far from the main topic of conversation.
I work in a small group of 6 women within a 60 person office. If my coworkers aren’t asking, my admins definitely are. It feels odd to reply “fine” when asked how planning is going and what projects we’re working on, but I just can’t get into a detailed conversation that many times a day. A more cerebral environment would be a welcome change.
My coworkers know just about all the details of my wedding planning (poor them!). My mother doesn’t really have much interest in helping plan at all, my sister is out of the country for school and is hard to access, and my other bridesmaid is my FI’s 12 year old daughter. They’re pretty much my only outlet, and I have to bounce ideas off of *somebody* or I’ll go crazy! Luckily we’re all really close and overshare constantly anyway ;).
I work in a hospital, and fortunately, there are a group of young ladies who also just got engaged. We will chat about tips regarding vendors, things that are going smoothly - and not so smoothly about planning, and if people from work are invited. The general consensus is no people from work are invited.
However, those people I have become close with who are not engaged are not usually part of that conversation. Instead, they ask politely about my plans and wonder out loud if they will be invited.
I have held them off for a while, but it has become clear that I will have to make a decision soon. And will have to find a way to gently exclude them. It makes me sad sometimes…. but then I remember that Mr Orange and I are footing the bill. And I get a little less sad.
PS. @Miss Lox: I have also been a wifey when returning something to BBB or Target. hahaha
@Miss Lox - so funny - I do that too sometimes. Like “oh, I’m just meeting my husband here.” Or “My husband made a reservation…” I did it secretly at first to practice but not in front of him and then one day I accidentally dropped it in front of him and he was like wha?!? Haha. I told him he better get used to it now… Only 1 month to go!
Onion rings? No. Cake, chocolate, ice cream, and sweets? But of course!
I get uncomfortable talking about my wedding at work, because I’m only inviting a couple of coworkers, and I don’t like bringing it up with people who aren’t getting invited. But people keep asking me about it! So I just try to keep it brief.
I’m in the same boat! I work as the Dept. Assistant in a university research lab, where the youngest instructor (besides myself) is 35 (that’s more than 10 years on me…). I feel like keeping my professionalism is tough enough without flaunting my “Youthful” marriage in everyone’s faces. They already talk about how crazy they think some of our students are for getting married so young (they’re only a year younger than I…). so it’s not something I like to discuss.
But one of my students is graduating the same weekend of my wedding, and she came into my office saying “YEEEEEE I graduate in six months!”, which meant I’ve been “wedding planning” already for seven. Oops. Not a whole lot done there. Gotta get on that.
I just received a promotion about 4 months ago so I don’t do much talking about weddings at work unless I am talking to he people I use to work with for the last 3 years.
Miss Pdog, I loved this post! I work with 6 other people, and the next youngest has right around 10 years on me. No one really ever asks about it, and I don’t bring it up. Really they would not be fun to talk about it with. Plus, I, like you, would prefer to keep work and personal far far away from eachother.
When I got back from the trip we got engaged on, I didn’t even say anything to anyone until someone saw my ring. They are all kinda debbie downers so I dont need their rain on my parade or their fake excitement
Actually there is ONE other woman in my office (almost old enough to be my mom) and once in a blue moon she will ask something like, “so do you have your dress” or “do you have a wedding website” and I will give a “yep” or “working on it” brief answer and then she will go on for about 35 min on her friends daughter who is getting married. Its really just a gateway question so she can blab - can you say annoying?
um, i had my first freakout last wee too. as in, i got so excited i couldn’t eat or sleep or workout of work or do anything but freak out. and then that changed to stressing. about every little detail. one at a time.
i was also a pretty annoying fiancee this weekend.
i’m clearly a fellow may 2011 bride!
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Mrs. Prairie Dog, Cincinnati Age and Occupation: 24, Program Coordinator Fiance's Age and Occupation: 25, PhD/Biomedical Engineer Engagement Date: December 18, 2009 Wedding Date: May 2011 Venue: Glendale Lyceum About Me: I'm a pilgrim soul of a girl with a house full of books and a coffee addiction that could slay Juan Valdez. My life is a whirl of grammar correction, good music, glue-gunning, and two pets named Hazel and Winston Churchill. I'm marrying my high school boyfriend in a formal-ish spring affair, roughly themed: "Elizabeth Bennet crashes a party co-hosted by Jay Gatsby and Cath Kidston, and loves it."
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