In White

She walked out of the dressing room bedecked in a fitted white dress, with just the right amount of frills and a long train trailing behind her. She looked absolutely amazing. Though she was wearing the borrowed shoes from the shop, and the same messy hair that she'd thrown back in the car, she radiated beauty. My breath was actually taken away as she made her first exit from the dressing room. And as she stood on the pedestal, three mirrors elegantly reflecting her image around us, I couldn't help but think...

How can I be really happy for my friend while simultaneously completely disgusted by an entire industry?

Because just on the other side of the dressing area, there was another woman trying on her wedding attire, as well. And it all felt particularly cookie cutter to me. How could anyone decide on a wedding dress when every one they try on looks like a slightly altered version of the previous one? It's not like I don't understand wanting to look amazing on your wedding day. It's not like I'm all bitter and jaded and all those things I'm supposed to be post-divorce. I think it's just that the whole white dress, and reception, and all that stuff seems so contrived now. Everyone says it's about sharing your love with all the other people in your life. That's why my usually non-traditional friends go down the decidedly traditional route. That's why they buy white dresses and have fancy invitation and hire a violinist and encircle their fingers with platinum. It's about symbolism. I get it. I do. But it still feels so forced. Or dull. Or unoriginal.

As I watched these women try on the dresses they will eventually wear on their Big Day, I found that I was laughing to myself. Laughing because I was happy that the idea of a Big Day no longer has so much weight in my life. Laughing because I know I'll never feel the stress of silk and chiffon tugging at my body in the wrong way. Yeah, maybe I'll find myself intimately connected to someone again at some point. But it certainly won't culminate with white and napkins and an incision into four tiers of cake. Because when I see so many married people, I see that things have already culminated for them, and it probably wasn't long after their Big Day.

Is that totally biased? Maybe. Did I learn so much from having had one of those days in my life? Absolutely. Would I take it back and redo it with now that my attitude on the whole thing has shifted? Never.

I'm just happy to know that I'm no longer on a journey that must culminate in white. Instead, it'll weave through yellow and pink and orange and green.