Late one night, on the eve of maybe my third wedding anniversary, I adopted a bizarre ritual of trying on my wedding dress. Ladies, as you can imagine the idea is ripe with disappointment and despair, as most women know, months leading up to a wedding is when one starves themselves just to fit into that beautiful dress, take a twirl on the dance floor, get some photos taken and then poof—that beautiful gown you spent weeks or months searching for is zipped into a bag or put into a cryogenic freezer never to be seen again. As my backside seems to grow larger by the birthday I now think of my wedding dress as a kind of lovely doily; pretty, yet outdated and absolutely pointless. My loving husband, being in the military, has been absent for about 15 of our 23 anniversaries leaving only one witness to my bizarre ritual, my faithful dog, God rest his soul.
This year as I unzip the garment bag, I marvel at my beautiful gown. The hand beading glides along the bodice, while the train is heavily loaded with embroidered flowers and pearls. As I struggle with the weight of the gown and pull up the straps I carefully inspect myself in the mirror. Unfortunately, this year the dress will not be zipping up. It zips as far as my waist and comes to a tragic halt. My weight gain and the subsequent impossibility of the dress zipping is not entirely my fault, although I am sure the 3 cookies a night house rule doesn’t help the situation.
23 years ago, 2 months before I was married something tragically wonderful happened! I was struck down with pneumonia and pleurisy. This wonderfully nasty combo caused me to lose a significant amount of wait prior to the “Big Day.” The weight loss turned my waist into a stack of dimes. I look at my wedding photos now and marvel at the waif looking back at me… men, you will struggle to understand why a young betrothed woman would be thrilled over a debilitating illness which would cause such weight loss and for that I do not have time here to explain. Such is the insanity of beauty standards in the western world. Alas, 2 decades later, as I struggle to move in the billowing white dress I liken myself to a 10 pound ham in a 5 pound sack just as Chick-Fil-A and the Lord intended.
The rest of my anniversary tradition alters slightly according to location and job. Years ago, when I worked as a deputy on the 4:00 to midnight shift; I would come home alone (my man was deployed) from work, take off my unsightly polyester police uniform, put on my tiara, wedding gown and shoes. I would pop open a beer and watch Conan O’Brien. Afterword, I would cue up Shania Twain’s, “From this Moment” on the sound system and dance with my dog while he balanced on his back legs eventually getting caught up in the train of the dress. Once I exhausted myself and him I would drag myself around the house looking at all of the things which hold such fond memories, like our wedding photos and the bizarre wedding gifts I still have and no idea what to do with… For instance, a salt and pepper shaker set— the pepper being a rooster and the salt a cat (let that marinate). The plastic green faux marble desk clock which was missing the the 12, 2, & 5— for what reason I can’t explain. The scary vase with a screaming woman’s face surrounded by white daisies etched in the glass has a special place in my dreams, but the taxidermy squirrel wearing a jaunty little hat might be the most disturbing of all (We lived in Florida at the time- if that clears anything up). I think her name was Irma…
Then there are the sentimental things I don’t want to do with but can’t seem to part with like our wedding invitation responses and the congratulatory wedding cards our guests took the time to write; these things I keep and move with us wherever we go. After traveling down Memory Lane, and drinking too much I usually collapse into bed half drunk, completely depressed, and yes- still wearing the gown.
This year however, I strode out of the bedroom with my dress half zipped up, my veil with the pearl encrusted tiara listing to the right and noticed something very peculiar. My husband was sitting on the couch stone still staring at me as if I had gone completely mad. It was then I realized he had never been present for one of these “Perfectly Normal” ( as my therapist calls it) annual events. I shrugged off his look of concern and asked him if he would like to dance while cueing Shania. As he shakily got to his feet, eyeing me like a doctor would a psychiatric patient he asked,
“Are you alright?”
“Of course I am, I was just reminiscing about our wedding and wondered if you would like to spin me around the dance floor?”
With a worried look he slowly walked toward his deranged patient and reluctantly obliged. After a few laughs, a few turns, and one too many dips I swept back into the closet and zipped the beautiful gown back into its garment bag for another year. From the living room my husband yelled, “You looked beautiful, just how I remembered.” and there it is— my heart exploding with love and gratitude and I was reminded for the millionth time how lucky I am and even though I am… ahem… bigger on the outside my insides are still the same. I still feel like the young lady who had no idea what to expect, no clue what the future might hold, but I knew I would have my man and he would have me, and now 23 years later here we are, still together, happy (as long as there are no home projects looming) and relatively healthy. Life is not perfect and although we still have no idea what our future holds, he will have me, such as I am and I’ve got him come what may right here under the pines…
mockingbirdonbroad 