An excellent piece.

Also, a brief, perhaps insufferably smug anecdote: My wife (of 22 years) and I have never understood the big perfect wedding obsession. We did ours cheaply, on our own terms (there were lots of firm lines drawn with entitled relatives), wanting to get to the marriage, not the wedding. We are both introverts, and my wife doesn't care to be the centre of attention, so the whole wedding thing wasn't naturally our cup of tea in the first place. We were tempted to elope instead, but for the benefit of our parents, we gritted our teeth and did the wedding.

On the day itself, we had fun (despite interminable photographs), and as I said, did things on our terms (for instance, we projected favourite film clips for guests to view during the signing of the register, instead of them having to endure someone singing Celine Dion or something equally vomit-inducing). Not everyone approved, but we didn't care. As you say, the marriage is the important thing, not the wedding. I've lost count of the number of people I know who were obsessed with expensive, perfect weddings, but are now divorced.