In a developing story emerging out of Concord, NH, 32-year-old Ava Barlowe is planning her wedding and having trouble deciding whether to invite “fringe” friend groups, such as her immediate family.
“It’s just that if I invite her, I have to invite that whole group,” Ava bemoaned, referring to her mother and the rest of her “mother’s side,” which includes her father, brother, and all her aunts and uncles. “I just don’t know if that group is going to gel with everyone else, or if we’re even close enough for them to want to come, you know?”
Ava also included all members of her family present at her birth in “that group.”
“Planning this sort of event is really tricky,” she told reporters while standing over her seating chart. “You don’t want anyone to feel left out, of course, but you also don’t want to invite anyone who might change the vibe of the whole night. For example, my Uncle Rob.”
According to sources close to the family, Uncle Rob is “kind of a whole thing.”
Ava maintains she does want to invite her mother, but if she does, she’d have to expand the guest list considerably.
“I would just be obligated to invite a whole new group of people,” she continued. “It’s a real ‘If You Give a Mouse a Cookie’ situation. If I invite my mom, I should probably invite my dad…and my aunts on my dad’s side…and my grandma.”
Reporters couldn’t quite find the problem here, but Ava’s fiancé, Mark Green, backed her up.
“I completely understand this sort of predicament,” he said. “Like, when I’m hosting a dinner party, I could invite Josh, but once I invite Josh, that kind of opens up a whole other group of people that I should invite or risk hurting their feelings. She just feels that way about her parents.”
Among Ava’s concerns with inviting her family include “making all my other friends feel weird” and “having to regulate the open bar.”
As of press time, Ava decided it was probably best to just bite the bullet and invite her mom and associated family members. She does maintain, however, that she’s drawing the line at her fiancé’s family.
“If we invite his family, we should also invite some of his friends,” she said. “And then the wedding becomes a whole thing, you know?”
