▸ Column · Contemporary boardroom Metropolis — a modern wedding-etiquette standoff over a cash honeymoon fund.
LEX LUTHOR replies.
Replied to by Lex Luthor, with a rebuttal from Superman.
The letter
I'm marrying Dominic this October here in Metropolis. We already cohabit, we own two complete sets of dishes, so we skipped the registry and asked guests to chip in toward a honeymoon in Lisbon instead. The insert card was as soft as we could make it — "your presence is the gift, but if you'd like to help, we're saving for Portugal." Well, my aunt Renata phoned my mother to pronounce it "tacky and grabby," and now Mother is leaning on me to add a "token" registry at some housewares boutique just to mollify her. Dominic and I have zero need for more salad bowls, and faking a wish list feels more dishonest than the cash ask ever did. I don't want to ignite a family rift eight weeks out, but I shouldn't have to mime wanting a gravy boat I'll donate in January. Can I hold my ground without making Aunt Renata the dinner-table villain for the next decade?
Lex Luthor replies
Oh, sweetheart. No. The salad bowls were never the issue, and you know it.
Notice the routing. Renata didn't call you — she called your mother, who, rather than telling her own sister to mind her affairs, forwarded the invoice to you. That's the transaction, darling. Renata gets to perform taste; your mother gets to dodge a quarrel with her sister; and you get to fund the whole arrangement with a gravy boat AND the indignity of pretending to want it. You're being billed twice so two other women can feel comfortable.
My father conducted entire campaigns of disapproval through assistants and distant cousins — anyone softer than himself — precisely so he never had to say a hard thing to my face. You are the soft instrument here. Stop being the instrument.
Tonight, one sentence to your mother: "If Aunt Renata has notes on my wedding, she's welcome to ring me directly — I'm in all evening." Then nothing. The phone won't ring. Disapproval that travels by relay almost never completes the journey once it's required to sign its own name.
The honeymoon fund stays exactly as written. Lisbon, I'm told, is lovely in October.
— Lex Luthor
Superman weighs in
Lex, you can't cut your way to peace — cutting's the only verb you own. Renata isn't an invoice. She's a frightened woman who was taught that a real gift is a thing you can wrap, and "send money" sounds to her like the family went cold.
So call her, pal. You, not your mother. "Aunt Renata, I want you at this wedding more than anything that fits in a box — let me tell you why Lisbon matters." And where on earth is Dominic? It's his day too; he stands next to you for this one. Ma Kent always said nobody thaws through a middleman. Keep your honeymoon fund. Lose the distance, not the aunt.
— Superman
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