what's the fuss about wedding gowns anyway?

i have asked myself this question so many times over the past couple of months, and never have i come up with a logical, satisfactory answer. nonetheless, the search for that one special dress that i will wear for about 6 hours - 8 max - continues.

i remember the very first time i imagined what my wedding gown would look like. it was about 6 years ago, while i was watching a school play starring my niece. she played the role of the bida pero kawawang princess, and her evil stepsister wore a royal blue gown that, at the time, looked simply magnificent to me. i vowed then: i will wear a royal blue gown when i get married, exactly like what evil stepsister was wearing.

i won't.

the next gown i pictured myself wearing when i wed was a gown i saw on teri hatcher in a magazine my officemate lent me. it was a combination of pastels - pink, peach, orange, yellow, layered one on top of another. i can't quite describe how it looks - only that when i saw it, the word "shimmering" suddenly became visible to me. but my officemate has left for vietnam and i can't remember what magazine that was and i have spent hours browsing the net looking at pictures of teri hatcher and i still can't find that gown. so that's down the drain, too.

moks has his own idea of what he wants to see on me at our wedding. his vision can be summed up in one word: tight. the thing about him is that he's very articulate but he's not much of an illustrator. actually, he is no illustrator at all. here's his rendition of my wedding gown.

looks more like a tooth, or a zipper, than anything to me.

i'm certainly more creative than moks, but my visualization of his idea was not much of an improvement either.

which is why thank God, really, for creative designers and wedding magazines and wedding sites in the net. i found the gown design i want - and would most probably go with - in a site selling designer gowns. i've been imagining the alterations and additions to the gown design from the pictures i've seen in the mags. and i've alreaady sat down with two designers to discuss the details. the second designer i met with put on paper exactly what i had in mind for the entourage without me describing it, and her drawings were far better than what i was able to sketch even in my mind.

i still have to meet with three other designers this week, after which we will decide who to go with. considerations, of course, are affordability and dependability. i have already decided to drop from my options a designer whose creations are quite affordable but who cancelled on two meetings with me. i think it's too risky to trust a designer who can't even be professional enough to make time for a pre-arranged meeting. i' m not worried anymore though - from our meetings with the two other designers, looks like our search for our perfect gown-maker will not go unrewarded.

moks is already complaining, though, that i am only making arrangements for what i'm gonna wear, and that i'm not paying any mind on what he will don on our wedding. so just to pacify him, i'm making another call for help here. moks doesn't want to wear barongs or suits for the wedding. he wants something he would be more comfortable in - something like a cross between a barong and an indian kaftan. anyone know any tailor who can make this?

The road to tomorrow

Leah's taking care of a thousand and one things to ensure the wedding day will run smoothly, and she's doing a remarkable job at it. But while I am happy to support her on her choices on the details she want for the wedding, there is one thing in all the preparations that we need to do which I'm not only vigilant with, but actually eager to pursue: the marriage counseling.

What is God's will in marriage? How can we love our in laws, despite the initial difficulties we have encountered? How should we handle the issue of money, especially since she's earning a ton more than I do? What's the godly way of raising kids? Is it better to keep the things that happened in the past buried or should we raise them like zombies? How do you keep the romance alive through the years? How do we break down the walls that we have built our entire lives and start living as one? Why is a man asked to love the woman, while the woman asked to submit to the man? What are the tips to having a mind-blowing sex life? And most importantly, on the moments when the thing we want most is to stab each other to pieces, where is the safest place to hide the knives?

These are just some of the questions Kuya Dong, our pastor, would guide us through in our sessions. They are far from being easy. Most of the discussions require us to look deep inside ourselves, oftentimes in areas we would rather keep hidden, and drag these baggages up into the open so we could surrender them to God.

It's difficult. It's painful. We think that some aspects of our personalities determine who we are (like Leah's fierce independence or my contempt for drama), but sometimes these traits are exactly what we need to work on. It's obtrusive, bothersome. Oftentimes I pity Kuya Dong when we're in our sessions -- with all our rants, he has to be our psychologist, our counselor, our Kuya, our pastor, our friend.

Truth be told, I would not normally allow myself to be subjected to such in-depth evaluation. Surprisingly, while I am usually set in my ways and 'obstinate' is the more polite description used for me (hard-headed ass is the common term), I approach these marriage counseling sessions not only with openness, but with hunger, because I know we need it. Past the pictures and the flowers, the venue and the food, the number of guests or the honeymoon, or even how much we profess to love each other now, facing these issues and realigning our lives with biblical principles is the only way to ensure that we would still be honoring each other five decades from now. It's not our money or our jobs or any form of preparation that will determine our future -- it is this: the surrender to our God, the gift of His grace, His headship in our marriage.

And though we are imperfect and -- as Kuya Dong is unfortunately subjected to every session -- and we still have a lot of things we need to work on, I am confident of this wedding not because of what we can do, but because I know my God is faithful to His promises (that He will not stop until the good work He started in us is finished), regardless of how flawed we are.

gowngowngowngown

i'm going to write a more substantial post on this when i have the time. (right now, i'm just so busy i can't even think of a nicer way to phrase it.) but i do need some suggestions asap, so here's another cry for help:

would you know of a good but cheap gown designer? i really don't want to spend too much on my gown, i'm gonna wear it just once anyway (and i have good shoulders and a shapely butt so any simple gown would look spectacular on me... kidding!). but i'm a bit scared of trying the baclaran and divisoria gown-makers - i've read one too many horror stories about them in w@w. could you recommend one?