May 8, 2011

SAM SHARPE

Bachelor parties. Many women fear them. Many men wax rhapsodic about them. Me, I’m actually pretty dispassionate. Maybe it’s a function of age. It’s a generalization, but in my experience the younger the bachelor, the greater the danger. When in our 20s, we men are liable to get stupid drunk, grope strippers, blow wads of cash gambling and wads of…well you know where I was going. In our 30s this equation changes a little; the drinking is more restrained, the strip clubs are less essential, the wads of cash are more judiciously spent while the wads of…well, I’m not sure what to say about that.

This was driven home for me at the most recent stag I attended. I’m in my 30s, yet I was the second youngest attendee. And much like the last few stags I’ve attended, this party was nothing like those of my “youth”. Gone were the strippers, wild gambling and general lewd conduct. Good food, high quality liquor and robust discussions of girls, sports and sex stood in their stead. Part of me misses the bachelor parties of my 20s but the rest of me recognizes I’m in a better place.

Plus, all things considered, with a couple of notable exceptions, pretty much every stag I’ve attended has been a relatively benign affair. A little booze and food here. Maybe a little music. A little dancing. Potentially a little exposed flesh. And when it’s all over the men return home to their wives and families/bachelor pads and dens of iniquity.

And like any social gathering, there are valuable lessons that can be gleaned from observing men while attending bachelor parties. But the single most misunderstood thing about bachelor parties is:

The groom is usually the most well behaved man in attendance.

Look. Scores of women lose sleep, pull out their hair, hire private investigators and consult the tea leaves trying to come to terms with or understand the full scope of activities scheduled for their man’s bachelor party. Waste. Of. Time. First and foremost I’ve never attended a bachelor party wherein the bachelor was the wildest of the wild. Ladies, imagine the lewdest, most crass behaviour your husband to be could partake in at a bachelor party. Good. Now, understand that whatever you imagine him doing, his friends are doing worse. Far worse. See, bachelor parties aren’t really for the bachelor. They’re for his friends. It is their excuse to get wild and woolly all in the name of guiding their friend through this final stage of his single-hood.

The lesson here? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; ladies, get to know your man’s friends. Make them your friends. Get in their good graces. If they don’t like you, respect you or otherwise give a f*ck about you, then they surely won’t respect your relationship. And if they don’t respect your relationship, when they get out into the wild, unregulated arena that is the bachelor party they’ll feel no compunction encouraging your man to engage in activity of which you wouldn’t approve. If you don’t want some stranger fellating your man or worse you don’t want him “eating out at unlicensed eateries”, befriending his friends is compulsory.

Also, for those ladies whose men are attending a stag: Don’t send him out with a loaded weapon; someone or something is liable to get shot.

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