I made a decision: I'm going to choose and buy my dress alone. When I go in focused and ready to actually pick the dress, I'm not taking any of my friends. It was so fun to go with Bonnie that day - I felt like the princess that I will never really be. If you know me, and if you know how empowered I felt after reading Marjorie Williams' essay on princesshood, you'll know that it's not a bad thing not to wear a crown - but there are moments in the life of a grown-up tomboy that feeling like a princess is like feeding candy to your soul.
But after having several lukewarm (and over-the-shoulder, if anything) discussions with Scott about the gown I love and 1) hearing him say that it would call too much attention to me (<-- art major + pragmatic personality = scott) and 2) never hearing him say that I would look beautiful no matter what I wore, I realized that he should never have had a say in the first place, because the wedding gown, as I see it, is the one thing on that day that belongs only to me.
Either he has been gently trying to tell me to stop bothering him with these details, as he doesn't give a fig what I wear, or he really thinks it's an overly outlandish dress, or he really thinks nothing should call attention to me that day. But the point is that this is the one thing about our wedding that is not about him. Everything else - the ceremony of it all - is ours. Joined, shared, ours. These pre-wedding decisions - place, time, people? He has as much say as I do. But that dress? That dress is not what I give to him - I give him me. The dress only adorns me.
The dress will be a valentine to myself, an important one - the outfit in which I deliver myself to a shared life, but that also declares that I will always and forever belong to me. It may not be the red dress I've dreamed of, but I've decided that as I prepare my heart for Scott, I'm getting dressed for me alone.
So I have put aside notions of renting the dress, and I've put aside notions of a wild splurge. Because it has to belong to me and no one else, and because I have to pay for it myself, no credit. So, I have no idea what I'll come up with. I only know it'll be something special.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
that seems like 3 decisions to me. 1) dress shop alone. 2) not rented. 3) no splurge. as far as taking no one with you... i dunno. second opinions are good, just make sure it's an opinion just like yours.
Doesn't he realize that it IS about you? ...sigh...
Post a Comment