The least romantic thing you can do is to get engaged

In my tracksuit full of soy sauce stains (because: big sushi fan) I am slouched on the couch. And I just got ’married‘ for the municipality.

Then my mother calls to congratulate us. And my in-laws send a huge bouquet of flowers. And a group of friends orders a bottle of champagne for us. Apparently, everyone finds it quite something, except us. But maybe we are a bit bitter, accidentally. Because in Amsterdam, it's anything but sweet, sultry, and romantic to get engaged. You just do it online. Behind the laptop.

In fact: everything you need to register your marriage is a DigiD. That !%^$%!1 DigiD. I just always and forever forget the password. I know there always has to be an uppercase letter, seventeen lowercase letters, an inverted backward number, and a special character, but for some reason, my brain doesn't remember whether I used a =, a !, or an @. That's why the atmosphere on the couch was already very rosy and moonlight, so to speak, even before we could fill in our names.

“How come you always forget all your passwords? SIGH.”

“I only always forget the one for my DigiD, you know.” Not the best defense, but I have to say something.

“Maybe you should write something down in one of those four agendas of yours.”

“Those are notebooks!” It’s pointless. He’s right. A wonderfully chaotic marriage awaits us. He knows it, I know it. And that chaos comes from my side. Oh well.

We just grabbed a red wine because after logging in was successful, it was time to fill out the questionnaire. You won't believe it. ‘Whether we accidentally are already married to someone else or have a registered partnership?’ Not that we know, but definitely good to check with each other. Second question: ‘Are you not related to each other?’ ‘Also no distant cousin or niece?’ it says. We can laugh again. Thankfully, we’re not that crazy, with our DigiD fuss. We upload a copy of our passports and then I can finally check the button: ‘Indicate that you want to marry X van der X’. Oh, The Voice is just starting, let me check.

(…)

I think the average Monday morning in our house is even more romantic. But okay, the municipality now knows what’s going on after all the checking. And there are still plenty of sparkling and sweet parties coming up this year, for sure. So I secretly enjoy that tracksuit as long as I can.

FACTS

• Since September 1, 2015, it is no longer necessary to make an appointment with the municipality to get engaged. Nice and online, guys.
• An average wedding costs the couple 15,000 euros.
• Only 25% of the newlyweds have sex during the wedding night.

Image: Pinterest