What happened was:

After they got engaged, she felt increasingly anxious about the things she usually felt anxious about and began to worry about all manners of new things she’d never worried about before.

She began thinking she should do things. And, since she really had no idea what things she should do, she thought the first thing she ought to do was research what things exactly needed to be done. 

It turned out there were practical things like rings and ceremonies and parties and invitations and dresses and hairstyles, and surrounding these practical things there were other things like debates she was supposed to have with various people about what and which and when, and who – including who should do x or y but not a or b – and discussions about whether the whole thing should be about this or that and/or not-about-that or not-about-this. And of course, there was the cost of things. 

She should look up places that had various wedding-related items and advice, she thought. And so she could make the proper decisions, she should probably look up the meaning of things. For instance the different parts of the ceremony, and whether a particular part should be included or excluded based on its meaning and whether it made sense for her, for them. She should talk to the minister. Not that they had agreed on who he was yet, but John-the-minister was also Aida’s husband and a friend, and it’d be nice to have him officiate, which is what she thought they called it. Officiating? She was not Episcopalian necessarily, but she’d been to his services now and again. And mostly, he was down-to-earth, born and raised in Queens, hilarious and smart. He once, just on his way out to conduct a funeral, walked around the living room that she and Aida sat drinking tea, and dressed in his formal minister attire, swung a set of cow-bells, predicting that no one would really know if it was appropriate or even really care if he just started wandering around the funeral with the cow bells, swinging them as though they were incense at a Greek Orthodox or Catholic Mass. “They wouldn’t even think it was crazy if I did this,” he said, swinging them around, the cowbells clanking loudly and hurting all of their ears. This is why she loved John.

She should ask if he would speak about Carl Jung at the wedding because John-the-minister loved Carl Jung and she did too, and that would be quite fun, she thought and better than the regular religious messaging. Maybe he could reference Star Wars, too. Or at least Joseph Campbell.

There was so much to learn and decide and none of them were particularly appealing to spend her time researching, she thought. Except maybe talking with John, who was always fun to talk to anyway.

Perhaps she ought to see if the neighborhood bar would allow them to take over the place and have a dance party. Although she had never really envisioned doing anything other than going to a courthouse someday, if she ever really even envisioned that, she did have fantasies of hosting a killer dance party. She liked to dance very much.