Devan Sipher is a writer of the Vows wed­ding col­umn in The New York Times and the author of the nov­els The Scenic Route and The Wed­ding Beat. He has also writ­ten for oth­er pub­li­ca­tions, includ­ing The For­ward and The Huff­in­g­ton Post. He will be blog­ging here all week for Jew­ish Book Coun­cil and MyJew­ish­Learn­ing.

My first nov­el, The Wed­ding Beat, was loose­ly based on my expe­ri­ence as a sin­gle Jew­ish guy writ­ing the Vows wed­ding col­umn at The New York Times. (“Always the wed­ding colum­nist and nev­er the groom,” is how the New York Observ­er described me.) There are a lot of things I learned that didn’t make it into the book, and here are a few of them:

1. MEN ARE ALSO FROM VENUS

Beneath the stub­ble and the Sports­Cen­ter addic­tion, most men are as con­fused, vul­ner­a­ble, and roman­tic as women when it comes to falling in love.

I’m not sure where peo­ple got the idea that romance is pri­mar­i­ly a female thing. When it comes to grand roman­tic ges­tures, from sweep­ing some­one away for a week­end in Paris to get­ting down on one knee on a white sand beach, there’s usu­al­ly a guy involved.

2. A RECEP­TION IS A RECEP­TION IS A RECEPTION

If you’re in the midst of plan­ning a wed­ding par­ty, trust me when I say no one will remem­ber the col­or of the napkins. 

Every wed­ding cer­e­mo­ny has a per­son­al ele­ment unique to the bond of the two peo­ple get­ting mar­ried, but recep­tions tend to blend togeth­er. Some are fanci­er. Some are quirki­er. But once the jack­ets are off and the guests are boogy­ing down on the dance floor, the Rock­e­fellers don’t look much dif­fer­ent from the Rubin­steins. And I can say that with assur­ance because I cov­ered two Rock­e­feller wed­dings – and one of them mar­ried a Rubinstein. 

3. THERE’S A BIG DIF­FER­ENCE BETWEEN ATTEND­ING A WED­DING AND WORK­ING AT ONE

The New York Times has a strict pol­i­cy about accept­ing any­thing that could be con­strued as a gift. So when I go to a wed­ding I don’t eat. I don’t drink. Bill Cun­ning­ham, the icon­ic Times pho­tog­ra­ph­er (and the sub­ject of the doc­u­men­tary film ​“Bill Cun­ning­ham New York”) has said he doesn’t even accept water. 

Work­ing at a par­ty is pre­cise­ly that. Work­ing. Watch­ing oth­er peo­ple enjoy a gourmet meal is a fat-free and fris­son-free expe­ri­ence. As an added bonus, when guests see me with a pen and pad in my hand, they often mis­take me for a wait­er and give me their drink orders. 

4. SAY­ING ​“I DO” ISN’T WRIT­TEN IN STONE – OR NEC­ES­SAR­I­LY EVEN IN INK

Odd­ly, a lot of peo­ple who make sub­mis­sions to The New York Times wed­ding sec­tion aren’t plan­ning a legal wed­ding. And I’m not talk­ing about gay wed­dings. There are cou­ples who have pre­vi­ous­ly eloped and nev­er told any­one. And there are cou­ples who want a wed­ding par­ty, but haven’t yet decid­ed if they want to make a legal com­mit­ment to each oth­er. But the most pop­u­lar rea­son for mak­ing non-bind­ing vows is that many cou­ples want their cer­e­mo­ny per­formed by some­one who isn’t legal­ly sanc­tioned to offi­ci­ate, and they don’t want the has­sle of a sep­a­rate civ­il cer­e­mo­ny at City Hall to make the mar­riage legal. This is what divorce lawyers’ dreams are made of. 

Before writ­ing an arti­cle, I always have to ver­i­fy if a legal mar­riage is tak­ing place. And it can often take a great deal of detec­tive work. A col­league has joked that the name of our depart­ment should be ​“wed­ding investigations.” 

5. GREAT LOVE IS NOT PER­FECT LOVE

I find the health­i­est rela­tion­ships are the ones based on mutu­al respect – not just for each other’s virtues but also for each other’s flaws. Cou­ples that can acknowl­edge (and laugh) about their partner’s imper­fec­tions (and their own) seem to have the strongest foundation. 

Love sto­ries that are too good to be true usu­al­ly are, and when I hear some­one describe their mate as ​“per­fect,” it’s a red flag. ​“Per­fect” is not an option in pol­i­tics or mar­riage. A tru­ly hap­py bride isn’t some­one in a state of bliss but rather some­one look­ing for­ward to what’s com­ing next.

6. HAP­PI­NESS IS A CHOICE

I think peo­ple like read­ing Vows columns for the same rea­son I like writ­ing them. They affirm life by show­ing that love can hap­pen at any time, at any place and at any age. 

So many things belong to youth: such as time, health, and Justin Bieber hair. But it turns out that love isn’t one of them. Hap­pi­ness is always pos­si­ble. As long as you’re alive, there’s always hope that some­thing new and excit­ing is around the corner. 

Falling in love is a lit­tle like writ­ing a book. You can feel a spark about a per­son or an idea. The trick is pay­ing atten­tion to that spark and choos­ing to pur­sue it. 

Devan Sipher grad­u­at­ed from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Michi­gan, received an M.F.A. from New York Uni­ver­si­ty, and he is a for­mer junior can­tor of Tem­ple Israel. Read more about him and his work here.

Relat­ed Content:

• How to Woo a Jew: The Mod­ern Jew­ish Guide to Dat­ing and Mat­ing by Tamar Caspi
• The New Jew­ish Wed­ding, Revised by Ani­ta Diamant
• Essays: Dat­ing, Love, and Marriage