Books |
The F Word
Kelly Bare
By
Published: Jan 01, 2007
Category:
Self Help
The F Word: A Fiancée Shares Her Story, From "I Will" to "I Do"
Kelly Bare
By all the conventional rules of book-reviewing, I can’t write about this book. Not only have I worked with Kelly Bare, I liked her enough to help her get her next job — a Web start-up where she walked away with $2 million. (Just kidding. She gave a terrific performance in an impossible role, and walked away mostly exhausted.) So for me to praise her book is…well…..the sort of thing that happens in the Real World more often than we know.
On the other hand….The Kelly Bare who wrote this book is not the Kelly Bare I know. And I mean: not in any way. I know a media professional who’s ice under pressure; in these pages we meet a bride-to-be so angst-ridden that, at a bridal shower, someone ought to give her dress shields. I know a New Yorker who wears black, our city’s official color; the author of this book is a Catholic girl from Nebraska whose boldest move in life is to fall for Jonathan Cohen, a Jew (but also from the heartland). Finally, I know an editor; here, we meet a writer, and not just an adequate one, but a real writer, the kind who opens a vein on every page.
Yes, I can write about this book.
It’s odd. I’m on marriage #3, and I don’t recall any of the moments that Kelly Bare describes on her way from 29-year-old girlfriend to 30-year-old bride. And the thing is — in just 220 pages, she seems to have covered every possible moment. And every possible emotion.
Make no mistake: Kelly wants to marry Jonathan. His proposal and her acceptance are “the most purely positive, purely emotional reaction of my entire life.” And she is a dream fiancee. On a trip to Dallas, she visits the Book Depository — not because she’s obsessed with John Kennedy’s assassination but because Jonathan is. She is a control freak, but she lets Jonathan make the travel arrangements. And she sucks it up and tells her ex-boyfriend — in person — that she’s getting married.
And then there’s what I think of as weirdness. She drags Jonathan to three “marriage education” seminars, where couples are taught to go below the surface and really communicate. (Even weirder: A guy in one of these courses asks her out.) She goes ballistic over two cardboard boxes in the living room of the apartment Jonathan now shares with her. She is maniacal about making sure that meetings between future in-laws go without the smallest hitch.
In short, I guess, she’s a fiancee.
It’s a job with a dizzying array of issues. His death, your death. Signing up for that ultimate cliche, a KitchenAid mixer. Dresses for bridesmaids. A dress for Mom. Thank-you notes. Waking up on your wedding day with a wicked bad hangover.
I’ll spare you the wedding itself — I get misty just thinking about it. Let’s just say it puts a final punctuation on a book that is a shorthand encyclopedia about a process that is too often left to wedding planners. Kelly and Jonathan may have dealt with more issues than they needed to, but they had a wedding that was completely their own.
Norman Mailer says, “You don’t really know a woman until you meet her in court.” With all that Kelly and Jonathan did to prepare for marriage, they may avoid that ultimate knowledge. You can do your part in lowering the incomes of divorce lawyers everywhere: Give this charming book — half-memoir and confessional, half how-to manual — to everyone who’s about to commit matrimony.
To buy “The F Word” from Amazon.com, click here.
