Category: Offbeat Empire

The joys and pains of writing personal essays for Offbeat Bride

Screen shot 2011-04-04 at 12.20.48 PMIn five minutes from now, another one of my personal posts will be going live on Offbeat Bride.

Normally I write posts like 17 wedding bouquet alternatives for fearless brides, Rock ‘n’ roll wedding favors to match your kick-ass wedding or geeky wedding cakes. These allow me to do my faovrite things which is to write, connect with people and (hopefully) help others. Invariably, my favorite posts are the personal ones though; No, he doesn’t wear a ring, Romance and marriage and this newest one The F word. But these are also the most frightening ones I ever write.

I often let them sit in the queue for months and months, afraid to put them up for review, because I know that once they go live, it’s like my soul is bared and has become carrion for our readers to pick apart, devour or spit out if they don’t like those particular pieces of soul meat that are my personal views. I can’t tell you how awful it felt when I posted about my husband’s choice to not wear a ring, thinking that the post would be a platform for other people to say “I don’t wear a ring either, and I don’t think I should be judged!” Instead, I got comments like, “I wouldn’t trust a man who doesn’t wear his ring,” “that doesn’t seem right,” etc, etc. Until it culminated in a public breakdown at the YMCA, where I’m pretty sure I scared the crap out of a little boy and his mother who were just trying to sign him up for a summer camp, and I had to just stop reading the comments.

And there’s always the fact that I will more than likely insult someone to their very core. I have a habit of being the most “offending” writer in the Empire. My sense of humor often rubs people the wrong way. Hell, even when I right light posts like an offbeat venue roundup, I somehow manage to upset people.

By now the post has gone live and the first few comments have not only been very supportive. But this one was downright AWESOME:

“I totally get what you mean when people don’t know how to react to you not saying that damned word but hey, you’re fu@king Offbeat Megan! You do whatever you DAMN please!”

And THAT my friends, THAT is why I love writing those personal posts.

However, I’m still taking bets on what will insult someone this time… I’m going with: “ARE YOU SAYING THAT PEOPLE WHO USE THE WORD FIANCE ARE BEING SNOBBY!? I SAY FIANCE. I’M OUTRAGED AT YOUR ACCUSATION MADAM!”

I guess it’s like anything in life — a give and take. By putting myself out there, I can connect with others who are like me, and I can also piss people off who aren’t like me, and vice versa. Either way, I love my job. The ups and downs of the roller coaster that is writing for Offbeat Bride is, at the least, never boring! 🙂

Offbeat Bride internship

A pink feather bouquet creation... just one of the many bouquet alternatives featured in my post.

A pink feather bouquet creation… just one of the many bouquet alternatives featured in my post.

During my seemingly never ending period of FUNemployment I’ve started doing an internship over at OffbeatBride.com, the patron saint of my wedding planning process. My penchant for amazing wedding photos and ideas just couldn’t be expunged, even after my wedding, so I thought I’d find another excuse to delve into the bridal world. That and I’m learning a BUTT LOAD about the business of blogging from Ariel, my rocking slave-master and the one who taught me the term “funemployment.” 😉

Anyway, the main reason for this post is to shamelessly promote a blog that I wrote called 17 Bouquet Alternatives for Fearless Brides in which I list a number of amazing non-floral bouquet choices either posted by other Offbeat Brides or thought up in my wedding filled brain. It was my first post as a big girl intern and I’m pretty proud of it.

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