Dream sequence
Oh, the bizarre dreams I have. This one seems spurred by my mom’s and best friend’s gentle nudgings to find them a son-in-law/brother-in-law, respectively. 😉
I dreamed it was my wedding day. I’d chosen a sunset time, so we had the whole day to get ready. I didn’t know my four bridesmaids — they were sort of inherited from the groom as all I had chosen was my matron of honor.
I was calm but getting more and more panicked as the supposedly magical hour approached. The wedding was in a church (odd given that I would probably elope if I could), and I looked out into the sanctuary, searching for familiar faces. Well, I guess there was just one in particular. He had his back to me, and all I wanted was to see him — apparently, I would know whether I were doing the right thing or whether my search wasn’t supposed to end that night.
I saw the groom before the ceremony, completely bucking tradition but not caring because I needed to see him — I guess for my dreaming mind’s eye, I needed to know how I felt about him. And I liked him. I thought he rocked. But. … Yeah. Exactly. No sparks. None whatsoever. Not even when I closed my eyes and tried to conjure them. And everyone seemed to know it.
Someone who was milling around in the dressing room with me overheard me talking to my best friend. The unwanted person volunteered rather unhelpfully, “Get married. You’re already here, so why not? You can always have an affair.” And we turned to her, horrified. Not because we’d been overheard, but that WTF? No, just … no. My friend went up and smacked her across the face. I loved that moment, mostly because one of us probably WOULD have smacked someone for less than that. 🙂
I went to look for that mysterious someone again. By now, he’d left. I wanted it to be because he didn’t want to witness my wedding, but I’d had no indication that anything could ever have happened with him or otherwise I wouldn’t have been there.
And that was a moment that jarred me. I remember asking myself if I wanted to be married if I were always going to be searching and wondering and looking for a way out. I wondered if I needed to pursue that other person, whomever it even was because I truly couldn’t figure out who he was — I just knew that I needed to talk to him. And now he was gone.
I actually let my own indecision make the decision. The four bridesmaids had traveled in a limo together to the church, and my friend came over to tell me that they’d been in a terrible accident. They survived, but their glamour and poise was compromised, to say the least. One of them needed to go to the hospital, and the other three said they weren’t going to go to the wedding — they needed to go with her. And I smiled at that, because here was a wedding that looked like 500 people had shown up for, and they were so loyal and committed to their friend that they didn’t even consider for a moment not being at her side.
At that moment, I decided it was time to call off the wedding. The groom truly thought I was being nice, that I just couldn’t let the show go on without the bridesmaids. And I realized what a big, dumb idiot he must be to not have a fucking clue what was running around in my head — four girls I barely knew who were perfectly fine couldn’t show up. Big deal. All you need is the couple and the person of the cloth to make a wedding happen. It was the marriage I wasn’t certain I’d be able to pull off.
It was almost like a movie, how my friend (and her kids, the flower girl and the ring bearer, and yes, she’s offered them to me to use. Her exact words in a real conversation to me were, “Get married while they’re still young enough to want to be in your wedding!”) left the church in our gorgeous formal-wear, free and happy and light. And I really did end the day with people I loved — just not the ones I expected to be leaving with.
I was bummed, of course, that I didn’t know what the next steps in my life would be. But my waking self knows that’s half the fun.
In any event, I’m (really) headed to Pennsylvania today, so enough with the dreams and now on to more important things, namely scrubbing my butt and gettin’ the hell outta Dodge. 🙂
August 6th, 2006 at 9:34 PM
Enjoy the trip to Pa. Your story, except for the lack of a happy ending, was intriguing. If you really want to break it down, it could be your subconscious, or the Big Guy Himself, saying “wanting to get married is great. But as you see, the only important thing required is that you have someone to love.you can have a great dress, bridesmaids, flowergirls, settings, reception, cake, flowers, handwritten vows, an open bar (mandatory), the whole sha-bang. But your dream pointed out to you, without the first required ingredient, what’s the point of the rest?”
I’m on the fence about wanting to get married again, but i do know I could care less where and how it’s held (as most guys will attest to, a wedding is all about the woman. You’re just the idiot in the tux). If i’m happy enough and in love enough to want to take that step, I’ll get married anywhere. It’s not the ceremony, it’s the life you try to create together once the pastor is paid and the open bar serves its last kamikaze that matters. My guess is the journey is just as, and in may ways more, important than the destination.
August 7th, 2006 at 11:39 AM
I can’t help but think you’ve been watching 4 weddings and a funeral too often. 😉