Thirty five years Ago On This Date and Just in Time for TMI Thursday, I Bring You - My Wedding Day

Mother grudgingly agreed to the marriage and even offered to pay for it if I would listen to her lecture. I knew the price of things, so I folded my hands and listened. “You will never have what your father and I have.” I said nothing although I thought my head would explode.  We had not yet gotten to the part where I could not wear white, could not invite any of my friends, and could not have the ceremony in my home church. I was after all a fallen woman and this was only what I deserved. My future husband wanted a grand occasion, something to remember. I wanted to go to the park and stand in the sunshine barefooted with my friends and say the words. I compromised and we certainly had something neither of us will ever forget.

Such was my consuming desire for my mother’s approval that I accepted all of her terms. I had survived for one year in fear of her finding out that my boyfriend and I were living together, holding my tongue, biding my time. I knew she would take my son from me in a heartbeat if she knew I was “living in sin”.  It is hard to explain how things were in that day but perhaps you will understand if I tell you that several of my husband’s friends hit on me after we moved in together, assuming I was easy.

I have no idea why I picked yellow for my dress, perhaps because it was the worst color I could think of, or maybe I still wanted my day in the sunshine. I thought I would do the sewing myself, but my mother insisted I hire a dressmaker. I found a little Japanese lady who lived in a trailer park. Her hands were nimble and she did not question my horrible taste in wedding dresses. One problem with a bride wearing a color instead of white is what to put on the bridesmaid. I am quite certain my sister was horrified by my choice of a yellow paisley design, but the rule is that no one can have a dress prettier than the bride, right? Besides, it was the seventies and our standards were lower.

It was an unusual spring in the way of Virginia weather, the world exploded with bloom on every tree, bush, and pathway. North Carolina was the chosen location to accommodate my man’s elderly grandmother and to marry in the magnificent Gothic church her husband built with his own hands. I slipped away from Grandmother’s colonial mansion at dawn while his family slept, and went to the hotel where my parents were staying. I had made my mother a hair appointment that morning at her request, but entirely forgot to make any plans for my own hair or nails.  Hours later when we arrived at the church to dress I had yet to think about my appearance. My hair took care of itself in those days, shinning with gold and auburn highlights and hanging almost to my waist. It was the kind of hair my mother called “stringy” and men longed to touch.

 Even with only 14 people in attendance we had an amazing degree of family tension. My parents had never met any of the new in laws and I can’t say it went well. My mother was wearing her slip when my excuse for a mother in law arrived. “How do you do,” she says to my embarrassed mother, “I’m Margaret Haley. Could you help me with my hat?” I raced to the rescue, directing mother to go ahead and get ready and telling Margaret that her hat looked perfect. I tried not to think about how things were going in the church. I knew grandmother would use this opportunity to lecture her former son in law on how he should have done things after her daughter, his wife, died. I worried about my son back in Richmond with my friend Gertrude. He should be here but I was so fearful he would innocently spill the beans as he was telling everyone that his mommy and daddy were getting married. Margaret decided she had done enough damage and headed to the sanctuary.

Somehow we managed to get everyone sorted into seats too distant from each other to actually fight. The organ played selections of my husband’s choice, none of which anyone but he and the organist had ever heard before. My dad stood with me in the back of the church holding tightly to my arm, a moment I had dreamed of all my life. The minister looked at us, twenty-eight eyes turned to stare. “Daddy,” I said, “it’s time to go.” My father shook his head no.

 “We’re not going until they play Here Comes the Bride” he stated in his stage whisper. I know the assembled crowd was getting nervous and I was in a near panic. My very conventional father knew his role well.  I looked at my future husband standing waiting down that long aisle. I pulled on my dad’s arm again, “Daddy, they are not going to play Here Comes the Bride. We have to go.”

In the pictures the church looks empty at first glance, and my husband and I are standing just to the left of center facing the minister. My father’s expression is his stage face in every one of them except for the two of us outside with the wind blowing my skirt and our nervous laughter about. The reception is simple in the extreme with the 14 of us milling about eating cake and drinking punch in the church social hall. Margaret amuses herself by telling the organist with the PhD in music all the things he did wrong when he played.  My mother pulls my new husband aside and tells him to “be gentle” with me because I am frightened. My sister in law cries crocodile tears and sneaks out to decorate my car for the get away.

 An hour is all any of us can stand. My parents and family are eager to head back to Kentucky. My new father in law and Margaret are headed over to Duke to visit friends at his alma mater, taking my new sister in law along. I change out of my horrible yellow dress into a lovely brown linen suit. When we emerge from the church basement there is no one there except for grandmother, and she is sitting in the back seat of the decorated escape car. My husband looks puzzled but she says, “Just drop me by the house on your way out.” So off we head, cans rattling from the bumper, a bold “Just Married” in chalky white on the back window, “Hot Springs Tonight” on the side of the car, and a tiny 80 year old woman sitting in the back. I slink down in the seat for the seemingly endless fifteen-minute trip through town.

Finally alone on the road we laugh hysterically about the events of the day, but we are young and resilient, ready for any challenge, but first, we need food. Neither of us had eaten anything but cake all day so we determine to stop in Morehead City for a nice seafood dinner. That was about that time it started sleeting. When we found a place to eat hail and snow was falling at an alarmingly rate and it was hard to see the road. The only thing I can say about our meal that evening is that I have never had a worse one in all the years we have been married. Slightly nauseous, tired and concerned about the weather, we looked for a hotel room. No we did not plan this thing well, but you know, not many people go to the beach in a snowstorm so we had no trouble finding a place.  

Now it’s time to close the door, like in the 1950’s movies, but I’m not that girl. However if you’re waiting to hear how the windows of heaven opened, well, not exactly. I pulled on my beautiful white nightgown, the one grandmother had given me with the admonition that she was not trying to make me out a virgin but every girl needed a pretty gown. I came out of the bathroom shyly to make love for the first time in our married life. As my husband glances up and down with a strange look on his face. I followed his eyes downward to see a crimson stain on my pristine white silk. Damn and double damn. The mother in law from hell, the ugly yellow dress, hail, sleet and snow, food poisoning, and now the visitor that I had never named “the curse” until this minute.  “Well,” I said with more than a touch of irony,  “I guess we didn’t have to get married after all. “