10 questions to prioritize your destination wedding invites
You can't afford to go to all of them.
Feel free to listen to an audio version of the text below while perusing your invitations to destination weddings:
It’s time to decide which destination weddings you’re attending in June, because the first one is this weekend.
You have neither RSVP’d to any of these weddings nor have you booked any travel. This is because you are paralyzed by FOMO, addicted to keeping your options open, and convinced that one of your friends will offer you a ride to at least one of the wedding destinations on their private jet and invite you to stay in the villa they have rented. (They will not.)
You have, however, directly texted each of the wedding planners in their native language using Google translate to inform them of your dietary restrictions, allergies, and preferences; kudos on making intollerante al glutine the cornerstone of your Italian vocabulary, which also includes ciao and gelato. As much as they appreciated you making them aware of your aversion to uni, they and the couples who have invited you to attend their very special week-long celebration on a spectacularly remote island that - before clicking on their Partiful save-the-date a year ago - you had never heard of would very much appreciate knowing if you’re going to turn up.
It is generally considered best practice to inform the couples of your attendance at least a few hours before the wedding ceremony, so today is a good time to decide which destinations would look best in your Instagram feed.
To use this guide to make a data-driven destination wedding invitation decision, simply add one (1) point for each YES:
Do you like these people $5,000 of your post-tax net worth much?
If you saw the happy couple in the Friend Shoppe packaged in a shiny compostable box wearing a big grin, fleshy Euro leather sandals, and Persols, holding tiny Italian flags and mezcal Negronis, would you purchase them for $5,000?
Would you pay $5,000 for professional photos at golden hour with super creamy bokeh of you pretending to not be aware that you are being photographed while mustering your most intense I-love-these-people-soooo-much-and-I-totally-did-not-sleep-with-either-of-them eyes during the exchange of their very untraditional, cryptic vows that cause their older, tertiary relatives to frown and whisper a little too loudly?
Would you pay $5,000 to go to the place where this wedding is taking place if there were not a wedding activities Google form that asks for your “Volcano Preferences?”
If you invested $5,000 into this couple, do you think that during the course of your friendship they would outperform the S&P 500?
If you invested $5,000 into this couple, do you think that during the course of your friendship they would outperform generative AI startups based in Palo Alto founded by second-generation Asian Americans who dropped out of Stanford?
Would you bet $5,000 that their marriage will not end in divorce in four years because one member of the couple was in an open relationship and the other was not?
Would you pay $5,000 to sleep with anyone attending the wedding?
Have you ever sunk $5,000 into an NFT or a cryptocurrency and of course instantly lost it?
If a Russian hacker removed $5,000 of your dollars from your checking account, would you still be able to go to Matcha Mama, Erewhon, and Burning Man?
If you answered YES to at least 8 of these 10 questions and the destination wedding invite has thus accumulated at least 8 points, you should attend.
You should respond to the second reminder and pretend not to have seen the 17 subsequent increasingly irritated messages from people who at this point are questioning whether or not you are the lifelong friend they thought you were when they decided to pay $125 for your dinner as an ROI on your $5,000 of travel expenses.
If they look at you like “what the fuck” when they see you at the first of the five rehearsal dinners, simply hug them and cheerfully, passive-aggressively tell them that their digital invites went to your spam folder and that you were expecting an actual paper invitation.
Enjoy your destination weddings, and good luck digging your way out of destination wedding debt.