Melissa's Place

Standing in a Snowbank


I went wedding gown shopping today. I was in Peterborough and really just wanted to spend some fun quality time with my mom and my aunt. “We’re just going out to have fun”, I warned in advance. There would be no actual purchasing, I insisted. Dress shopping is supposed to be the best part, my married friends have told me, so I wanted to savour it and make it into multiple excursions if possible. Involving many friends.

So we drove to the first downtown shop and it was not hard to not purchase anything. Everything was ugly and about fourteen sizes too large. It’s hard to walk when you’re holding up the front of your dress, hoisting the hem so you can walk, and pinning the dress in the back so your breasts don’t go hang out with your belly button.

The second store was different. We knew as soon as we walked into it that it was going to be more fun. There was a pretend runway! And stone walls and lots of mirrors and many, many more dresses. The woman really just grabbed anything I even remotely smiled at and put it in the dressing room for me. I had said, “Something really simple!” and I had thought, “Nothing over $500, it’s just one day.” My aunt had said, “When you try on THE ONE, you’ll know” and I thought, “I don’t know if it will be that dramatic”. So we tried on dress after dress. Most were too big, so we had to pin them in the back. The first one I really liked was a two-piece. The top was like a boostier (boys, if you don’t know what that means, use your imaginations) and the bottom was, well, like an enormous mountain of marshmallow topping. It was like standing in a snowbank, no, a snow fort! It was similar to popping your head out of the sunroof of a small white hatchback. But it was hilarious!

The best part about dress shopping is how everyone tells you you’re beautiful. They tell you anything would look good on you (yet somehow you’ve been convinced to spend thousands on a white, silk masterpiece). They hold their breath when you walk into the room. And sometimes they even cry a bit.

I was standing in the change room on a little stool while my mom was lacing up the thousands of corset-strings in the back of one particular gown when I looked into the mirror and said to her, “Oh dear. I have a bad feeling.”
“What!?” she asked.
“I have a bad feeling this is THE ONE.”

And it was. It was dress number, um, about fifteen. And it was the last one I tried on. After you’ve tried on THE ONE, all the others don’t seem worth the effort.

Just for the record – it’s not plain and simple like I’d envisioned. And it’s not $500. And if you think I’m insane, let me just say that I didn’t act impulsively. If it’s REALLY meant to be, it’ll be there for me next time I come back to Peterborough.