Last night, Red Beard and I both got off work at a decent hour. I brought home some blue marlin steaks, and Red Beard brought the Spanish rice. First we went down to the gym for some cardio, then we cooked up dinner. I felt like we were easing back in synch, and the tension lingering from earlier in the week was finally breaking.

This morning, after reading a few very insightful comments on the last post, I was especially struck by one left by jennetic. I tried to shorten it a little, but I obviously didn’t cut much out:

“…I think the person who is really being disrespected here is RB. …being in a wedding can be a labor of love. There is a sizable investment of time and money … if I were RB, I would be really, really ticked. You really go out of your way to be in the wedding party- for them not to do one simple favor for him, one that is important to him, is just total crap. My guess is that he is trying to deal with your upset feelings (which he seems to understand pretty well) PLUS his own feelings of resentment towards these people. They are supposed to be friends of his. They care enough about him to ask him to be part of their wedding. Something is wrong when he is asked to participate in their celebration of love, even as they refuse to allow the woman he loves to be there and share it with him. It is NOT tacky to let the fiancés know that they are being extremely disrespectful towards RB in their decision not to invite you. It’s a slap in the face to him, IMO, and it’s been upsetting to you. I feel that you have every reason to be upset! But try not to make this about your validity in RB’s life or anything like that. He has been clear that he really wants you there and that you are very important to him. This is really about RB, and he is in a no-win situation. At best, he found out something pretty lousy about people who he considered his friends. It is going to change the friendship for him, and since they are all part of a long established group of friends, this has to be really uncomfortable and discomforting. In addition, it’s added stress to his relationship with you. There is no upside to any of this for him. I agree with the poster who said that this couple is likely to drop down a few notches in the eyes of their friends. Even if they come to their senses and invite you later on, some damage is done. If I were in your shoes, I would expect to spend as little time with this couple as possible once the wedding is over with. Sure, there will be larger get-togethers where they are not avoidable. But they would not be included in my tight circle of friends after this stunt- that is how I think I would feel if I were RB (barring some moment when they realized what asshats they were being and apologized and made things right). Do not allow his friends’ lack of class or their disregard for RB affect how you feel…about you and RB as a couple. …you have the start of a really good thing with RB: he cares about you, he listens to you, he made room for you to move in with him, and he already has made a stand for you regarding the wedding. He cares about how you feel and seems willing to talk to you about it. None of us gets it completely right for every issue that comes up, and this issue is loaded for him- especially because it involves his circle of friends, it’s not as simple as just writing off an individual couple. It looks to me that he is showing you that he really cares about you in many ways all the time- you can focus on that and let your relationship grow. … Do not allow this wedding to become some symbol of whether RB loves you or not, or how much he loves you. It’s a crappy situation that the idiot bride and groom created, and it looks like he is just trying to find a way to deal with it. If RB starts to insist that you swallow your feelings or accept them as good friends or other such nonsense, then that is a red flag. You’ll find that out in time. In the meantime, though, you and he are two good people who are in the early stages of what looks to be a promising relationship. Build on that and you might find yourself with a partner in a great relationship strong enough to get through many tough issues and troubling times.”

Upon reading this comment, I suddenly felt a massive surge of empathy for Red Beard. I sent him an email this morning that went a little something like this:
“Heya Honey Bunny,
[blah blah blah, dinner plans for tonight and so forth.]
I just want to let you know that I want you to have fun with your boys at the bachelor party, so I understand the need to keep things cool right now. I know this isn’t an easy situation for you to be in.
Love you,
Roxy”