There is a contagion sweeping through Newcastle and it affects, but is not exclusive to, the age group of 25 to 35 years olds of every race and economic background. The symptoms include impaired judgement, sweaty palms, diminished individual decision-making skills, increased stress, the halving of your identity, financial hardships, and annual sacrifice ceremonies. I am referring to, of course, that bonding ritual of marriage.

I have noticed that over the past three years a great number of my friends have been married, and with more making plans, by the end of next year I will soon be in the minority. Almost two-thirds of people in the circles I run in will be hitched by the next year and why not, this town loves a party.

It seems to me that marriage is all about the pomp and ceremony of the actual wedding itself, because in my eyes it is back to life as usual after it is all done. And again why not, after the stress and in fighting of planning the wedding, normal life is a welcome change. You have to take the time out of your life to get suit and dress fittings, organise the caterers, choose the cake, make and send out the invitations, find a church and book the function room for the reception. Planning on this level is absent from most military strategies and can go on for months, sometimes longer, and to what end?

Everything must be perfect. The bride has to look better – almost like royalty – than the bridesmaids, who are virtually tortured in ugly dresses. There should be some sort of U.N. relief counselling for these poor women, no-one looks good in orange taffeta. And the men look somewhat confused or scared in the church, if you look closely you can see the beads of sweat on the face and the bobbing Adam’s apple from the gulping. And let’s not comment on the groomsmen, who either look like a James Bond villain support group or footballers advertising clothes in a Lowes catalogue. And the fashions in the pews are a mixture of every ill-conceived fad from the fifties through to the nineties including the metrosexuals from the new century.

And the receptions, well, they are filled with cheesy sentiment made famous by Hallmark greeting cards and Days of Our Lives and jokes your granddad tells, and that is just the speeches. There is also an amateur paparazzi clickfest, bad dancing, tears that dehydrate, overeating, and the excessive imbibing of alcohol that make it a necessity to find out exactly what happened that night from photographic evidence.

But apart from all this and the strange increase in prices for a wedding from anywhere between 50 and 80 per cent, these archaic sharing of vows seem to work. While you’re in the moment they are utterly breathtaking and fun to boot for everyone involved.

And for this reason, the wedding industry is not a budding one but one that is well-established. The inner city of Newcastle has a stretch of Hunter Street that is literally littered with bridal stores and tailors and suit rental places on both sides of the street. Many of the other business are there for the simple reason that these established establishments are there and it’s a virtual guarantee that the pedestrian traffic will pass them.  And Newcastle, like many other major town and cities, has an area like this.

Being somewhat against the institution of marriage myself, due mainly to the fine example my parents and some friends have set, I do feel very out of place at these joyous events. It is a feeling of trespassing on private property and that feeling is not because I’m not the focus of all the attention, not because I’m a bitter a twisted cynic and not because I’m jealous. I do think some people will fight against the feelings of loneliness, even while being is a relationship, because they hope.

I at one point in my life thought I had found the one I was meant to be with and I moved in with her, proposed and we were to get married, but mere months before the wedding she changed her mind, left and ran into another man’s arms. They were married a year later and I returned to the bah humbug reaction to marriage.

The lonely will hope for the best even though some of us will be alone for a very long time. But while our friends and family are getting married we will always be there and we are happy for the people we care about. And getting married in this town with the land marks for breath taking photography, various function and reception halls across the region that are unique, you can have the fairytale.

Marriage is not the beginning of the end, but a beginning that should be given a chance and that chance deserves more than bad press or a quick hitch at the registry office that has to be a celebration. For no other reason than to say the world can wait at the door, this if our time for hope, for happiness, and for love.

And if you are going to get married, get married in Newcastle. You won’t regret it, we need the business and I need a party.