Dear Reader,
It has been a day of deliveries!
First a special delivery from California, a pair of Vera Wang wedding shoes that I bought in a fit of madness off eBay. Thankfully, in the midst of my insanity I was shrewd. I choose the “Make me an Offer” option, and offered the seller the ridiculous and insulting price of $100. USD for a pair of brand new, gorgeous Vera Wang shoes!
After she stopped laughing, the seller wrote back, and suggested a compromise at $300. USD. I laughed, and wrote: “$125. USD.” She wrote back and said, “$170. USD,” and with that, we were done. A bargain.
I don’t how or when I actually gave into to the “designer shoe temptation,” and I must confess some extreme disappointment with myself, and a wee sense of failure on my part. The shoes, for all the hoopla they inspire are actually, well, quite ordinary-looking, plain and uncomfortable. Much of a muchness, I think. Expensive lesson learned.
Let’s hope I have more success with the second parcel of the day, fresh from John Lewis, my new favo(u)rite shop. The DEB has been dying to get me over to John Lewis in Solihull for weeks, and I don’t really know why I have resisted going.
We went over to Solihull on Sunday afternoon, after a late brunch, and we had a splendid day out browsing through John Lewis, followed by dinner and a movie. (I never managed to make that roast on Sunday, but that’s another story.)
So, John Lewis. Imagine all that is bright and beautiful about Target, Pottery Barn, Crate and Barrel, and Macy’s, take away the hordes of tourists and other spatial-challenged shoppers, and you have the English wonder that is John Lewis.
The DEB and I decided to have our Gift Registry at John Lewis, and I was happy enough to do the hunting and gathering online via www.johnlewis.com, but what an adventure I would have missed!
John Lewis has everything, and they are all about Customer Service. Yesterday, I began to panic about my first fitting at Eternal Bride in Warwick. Yes, it was meant to happen the first week of March, but, I chickened out and rescheduled to give myself more of a chance to tone up/get fit.
But, now, I’m ready, thanks to Trinny and Susannah! At John Lewis.com I discovered “Magic Knickers” created by none other than the Trinny & Susannah of “What Not to Wear" fame. (I used to love their show when it was BBC America.) I order them straightaway yesterday, and they were delivered to my doorstep in under 24 hours!
In this cute little box, with the ever-comic duo, T&S, camping it up on the cover, there is a device that promises to be the feminine fashion equivalent of Harry Potter’s “cloak of invisibility.” My new “Magic Tummy Flattener Thong” promises to make me look as if I have dropped a full dress size. We shall see. Lord knows, I deserve to look that good. I have worked hard enough!
Trinny & Susannah’s “Magic Knickers” will set you back more than a bob or two, a hefty £30. GBP to be exact, but the claim is that the results are worth it. For the more frugal, Marks and Spencer have created a rival product, rather unimaginatively called “Magic Pants.” (Rough about half the price of T&S’s brand.) Who doesn’t deserve a bit of magic?
Speaking of knickers, pants, and the like, reminds me of the many joys and woes of “the common language” Yanks and Brits supposedly share.
May I confess, here and now, that there are times, within full-length conversations that I have no idea what anyone is saying to me? That secretly, I have developed a very clever and highly-effective trick to navigate such moments: I smile, nod, laugh a little, and throw in an occasional “Yes, it is, isn’t it?” Then, as the Brits say, “Bob’s your uncle!” and no one has a clue, that I haven’t a clue as to what has just transpired. One must learn, however, to use this little trick judiciously, and where possible to avoid using the breathy laugh, “Yes, it is, isn’t it” response when someone has just informed you that their Granny has died.
Another linguistic “sticky wicket” for me has been asking for things. For example, for New Year’s Eve, the DEB and I attended a formal soiree, for which I had the most luscious gown to wear. (I have waxed lyrical about this dress in an earlier post, wherein I dubbed it “the Rita Hayworth dress”.) There was no way on earth I could wear this dress, low cut as it was, without what we Americans call “pasties.”
Pasties, pronounced in a way similar to how one would say “toothpaste,” are adhesive tabs applied to cover your nipples, in place of a bra. I searched high and low for “pasties” – no one had any idea what I was talking about. In one shop they looked at me as if I were quite, quite mad. Then, it dawned on me: same spelling, different pronunciation, entirely different word...
Pasties (pronounced like the word "past"): filled pastry cases, commonly associated with Cornwall, United Kingdom, made by placing the filling on a flat pastry shape, usually a circle, and folding it to wrap the filling, crimping the edge to form a seal.
A simple lesson to learn: In Britain, the devices that one uses to cover one’s nipples in lieu of not wearing a bra, are called, quite simply…“Nipple Covers.” Genius.
Slowly but surely one gets to grips with such fine tunings of the English language, and hopefully, it will become second nature that the First Floor is the Ground Floor, and that “Band-aids” are “Plasters.”
To be sure, the phenomenon works both ways. A while ago, the DEB & I had a meal with a fellow American and her British beau. At some point during the course of that very jovial evening, she and I revealed and shared a kinship with “Wednesday Addams”. She and I laughed hysterically. Our two Brit Boys smiled adoringly, and I think one of them may even have said something that sounded a little like, “Yes, it is, isn’t it?” We tried explain the significance, but really, it’s just one of those things.
A few days later, while out walking our beloved Lucy around a dark, grey, wet and rainy Barford, the DEB turned to me, and said: “Bit of a Tuesday Addams day today, isn’t it?”
“May one so easily catch the plague?” – The Countess Olivia, Twelfth Night
The “plague” that the Countess Olivia refers to is not the legendary disease that wiped out much of Europe in the Middle Ages; she is, of course, speaking of the “plague” of Amour: the infectious, ridiculous, delicious malady we call Love.
And one of the resulting, and long-lasting conditions of this ‘ailment’ is lunacy. And I feel myself falling steadily into its grip. In other words: Give a girl a ring, and she’ll lose her mind!
“Bridal Lunacy.” The frenzied, slightly breathless feeling that leaves you dreaming of ivory tulle, tossing and turning in the night, murmuring: “Vera Wang, Vera Wang must have dress by Vera Wang…”
What have I become??
Since we returned home from our wonderful New Year holiday in the Lake District, I have become a Bridal Zombie! Life has become very simple: eat, sleep, eBay!
I shouldn’t complain really, I am very happy indeed. And what a joy to finally, finally, finally to be doing this! The this of dreaming, planning, hoping, making a wedding with my darling D.E.B.! (Thank you, dear God for second chances! For giving a mad woman like me another go at love!)
Here is an honest, public apology to all of my married friends, particularly those for whom I’ve served as a bridesmaid, usher, flower girl, wrangler or witness: God, how I have envied you all! More than I even realized.
Important clarification: I don’t mean “envy” in a dark, snarky, nasty, bitter or spiteful way. My smiles, hugs and tears for you were very real and sincerely heart-felt. What I mean, if it is possible, and perhaps I should just find another world, I mean “envy” in a silent, deeply solitary and utterly unknowing way.
I had no idea I wanted such things, I had no idea I was so “girlie” after all. (Maybe the tiara I wanted and wore for New Year’s Eve should have been a clue…)
Here’s the thing. I like to think of myself as quite a practical, sensible person. I did confess recently that I have never bought a pair of $700 shoes. Although I admire my friends who have, and who keep such shoes as pets, I do honestly find it hard to get my head completely round such a purchase. So, I have no serious doubts that this coming year of wedding planning and purchasing will become a saga of: “When a Sensible Girl Goes Wrong.” I am strong enough--and broke enough--to keep my wits and credit cards about me.
However, I am fascinated by the way this whole “Bride” thing works, and the dizzying culture (and countless sub-cultures) that have been created and developed around it. And, I am all the more fascinated as I watch myself slip into this bridal vortex. The temptations are great, let me tell you!
I believe/hope the challenge lies in balance. Developing a balanced sense of “romance” and “realism”. These are uncertain and difficult economic times, yet, we are told, lead to believe that this (ones wedding day) is the highlight of your life. A woman’s “Oscar moment.” Yes, those are ideas that are promoted by a very commercial world, yet, I feel that there is some grain truth in it.
It is a very important day. Marriage is not something that should be entered into lightly. We should bring to it the best that we have, the best that we are. And as such, the wedding day should be marked precisely as the couple jointly see fit. An excuse for excess? Or, an event that is a couple’s crowning glory?
I think these factors are heightened and have even more meaning the second time around. Added to the standard frenzy, there is also a heart-felt sense of “I’m going to get it right this time.” (The wedding and the relationship.)
When I married previously, I was younger, greener, more headstrong and rebellious. There was no church, no family, no sense of occasion or celebration. That wedding lacked all the things that are—I see now—truly fundamental and important to me. Everything about it was matter of fact, happenstance, on a whim, thrown together, piecemeal, living on the edge. And, if I’m honest, it spoke volumes about a relationship that was very much the same. I own and regret my share of the blame.
So, this time. Older, wiser, better. In every possible way. With or without Vera Wang.
