Toasting The Couple

Every time I empty the dishwasher, I think about marriage.

The plates, the bowls, the forks, the glasses - all of it will have to be replaced, because married couples' dinnerware must match.

I'm headed to two weddings in the next few months. Both couples are in their mid-twenties. All four individuals have been lived on their own for years. Yet, somehow, they need new toasters.

Well, okay...they don't NEED the new toaster, but they placed the new toaster on their respective gift registries. Why? Do they hate their old toasters? Do they need a toaster that symbolizes their union - not your toaster, not my toaster - OUR toaster! The toaster that will feed our children!

These couples don't care about new toasters. They are victims of an outdated idea. Back in the day, when the 18 year-old man would marry the 16 year-old bride, the new couple needed stuff. They needed dinnerware because they didn't have any. They needed a toaster because they hadn't spent the last six years in dorms and apartments.

The age at which we marry has changed, but the gifts haven't. Instead of upgrading their toasters, we should be upgrading their TVs to plasma and their mattresses to that space foam stuff - gifts that the happy couples would much rather receive, gifts I'd much rather give. Of course, purchasing, wrapping and delivering such gifts to the reception would be terribly difficult.

So what's the solution? I don't know, but maybe I'll quit this gift registry game. Future couples can expect my gift to come in the form of a check - it won't be enough money to buy that plasma screen, but hopefully you'll use it for something more exciting and more necessary than a new toaster.