24 hours of being 35 (or: the drama with our wedding venue)
I slept for the first 5.5 hours of my 35th birthday, as one is wont to do from midnight until the time where the city snow plows start clearing the main street in front of your hours. That could only mean one thing – BIRTHDAY SNOWSTORM. I woke up, got ready for work, and realized a certain puppy and chewed the plastic nubbins off my work shoelaces – on BOTH shoes. She’s efficient if nothing else. And then I get to work and realize the Powerade Zero I brought is fruit punch and ew.
A little bit later, Amelia found out the lady that we’re working with at our wedding location had a bunch of anti-gay, Obama’s a foreigner, people on welfare get free iPhones shit on her Facebook. And that’s cool – you can have your own opinions. For instance, she also likes Michele Bachmann. I’d rather see which falls faster from the top of a mountain – a penny or Bachmann. And that’s okay. However, I’m also not in the business of trying to host Michele Bachmann’s wedding at a location that’s trying to really build up the amount of venues they have.
The internet was all like — EMAIL HER BOSS AND GET HER FIRED AND DEMAND A DISCOUNT AND (figuratively) BURN HER AT THE STAKE and blah, blah, blah. And sure, that would have been an option. However, you attract more bees with honey, as my step-grandpa used to say. He was a plumber that spent several years in the Marines, so I’m sure he dealt with some real assholes. I figured he’s right.
And, yeah, it’s our wedding and, yeah, we shouldn’t have to educate an adult on equality just so we can get comfortable getting married. But in the words of the great Macklemore: “No law’s going to change us. We have to change us”.
I gave it a few hours. This wasn’t an opportunity to put someone on the spot or to get someone fired or to use someone’s ignorance against them. And my blood was seriously boiling.
I emailed the owner of our wedding venue yesterday afternoon, stating very clearly that there was no need to discipline anyone, but more of an issue of creating awareness for your company and your brand. People tie a strong correlation between the image your employees present to the public and what your company is all about. Duh.
While we were at dinner celebrating the big 3-5, I got a phone call from the site coordinator whose Facebook. She was audibly upset and wanted to talk immediately. I obviously wasn’t available and told her I’d call her today.
I happened to check my email just after she called and the owner had responded back very quickly and was exactly what I needed to hear to feel more comfortable with continuing to host our location there. All was well and my confidence level in one of the biggest says of our lives happening at this location had been restored.
And then, this morning while I was in the middle of writing this very blog post, the coordinator wrote me back. She copied the owner and she copied Amelia and she was so extremely defensive. She was defending herself against accusations I’d never even made. She wanted to point out that she could have given our day away to someone else when the asked about it, but she didn’t. (Ooooh.) And my favorite – she also pointed out that her personal Facebook account reflects her personal beliefs and I’m trying to force people to have the same beliefs at me.
Now, hold it right there, Crabby Pants. I never said you were disrespectful. I emailed her boss because if my employees were publicly talking shit about specific group of customers that we service, I’d be absolutely horrified. I don’t care if she wants to be in favor of pooping in public. I was just asking for a little guarantee that the person in charge of coordinating the vendors, the food and overall location isn’t rude to my LGBTQ-supporting wedding goers or my non-white wedding goers that may or may not be “foreigners”. Not too much to ask for the chunk of change we’re dropping on this here thing, you know what I’m sayin’?
She also said in her email that she enjoys working with diverse groups of people and that’s what makes her job so fun. I totally believe that. I really do. And that’s what has me holding out hope for this whole situation.
I wrote her back – copying everyone in the world, since that’s what she thought she needed to do – and remained calm and professional, letting her know we’d moved on now that we’d gotten assurance that things would be handled professionally and without issue, we were solid and that we’d moved past this issue.
And I’m hoping that ties it all up in a nice little bow. Because if there’s no little bow when it comes time for our wedding, I will be the exact opposite of merry and bright.
I didn’t name any location or any person right now, because I’m giving things the benefit of the doubt. It’s my hope that this gets all cleared up and I can recommend this location to everyone, because seriously, you guys – it’s so super cool.
