The dress that found me

There's a feeling you get when something goes your way. My last few posts have been gushing wildly but when it's good, it's good.

I had spent the last week packing things and sending them off and trying to have a very broad-brush plan so I can appear organised and make myself feel better without seeming like I need to control it all. I'd make lists that were purposely in the wrong order say, or leave things to the last minute so they'd look spontaneous when in reality they weren't. Organised chaos was what I was looking for but in reality I ended up looking and feeling quite schizophrenic. So to calm myself down, I decided to go looking for a wedding dress a couple of days ago.

I didn't want anything wedding-y. I'm sure many people have said that they abhor the creampuff-let's-play-princess-and-fulfil-a-fantasy-I've-had-since-I-was-5 style dress but judging by what I've seen in weddings and in wedding dress shops, I'd say that's a bold-faced lie. So I went out with an open mind and a firm desire not to shop at a wedding dress shop.

"A cocktail dress, really," was what I told Adonis when quizzed on my preferred look. And so we looked for my "cocktail dress" here and there and everywhere until we found a breathtakingly beautiful Ralph Lauren gown that was so beautiful, I had to sit down.

It was layers of dusty pink and gold lace shot with more gold somehow, fitted bodice, dropped waist, strapless and flowingly ethereal. I picked it up as I walked around the shop and twirled for my husband-to-be. He said, "Wow." However, the dress being a one-of-a-kind Ralph Lauren, it was, quite expectedly, not my size. And frankly, quite impossible to alter. I needed to be twice the height I am now and in heels to maybe have had a chance in hell of carrying this off. So I let it go with a heavy heart.

But me being me and stubborn as hell, I wanted something similar. I went around looking and looking and finding fault with all presented to me.

One dress was "something I'd wear at someone else's wedding - not my own"
Another one was "too satiny"
Yet another was "too ordinary"
And finally one made me say, "Hello boobs"

Making our way to the bus stop from Bond Street, we decided to take a quick look at one wedding dress shop. Giggling I told the lady I want a wedding dress. She sent me away with a catalogue and we sat in the bus flipping through and earmarking a few dresses we liked.

Then we saw one dress which was decidedly lovely. It was also un-wedding-y yet unabashedly bridal and special and unusual and it was my dress. So, the very next day I called up to book an appointment (a "first try") and got swept away in all that is bridal.

The dress deserves its own paragraph. It looks a little bit vintage but timeless. Fitted bodice layered with fluid halterneck chiffon, dropped waist and detailing around that area and lace from there on downwards. Clearly a flowing dress and one that will look phenomenal with towering heels and an updo. Also a dress where I can frolic which is what I intend to do at my own wedding. I am so tempted to post a picture but something tells me that ain't right.

Anyway, that was it. That was my dress. And Adonis got it for me. And I pick it up next month. And corny as it may sound, it was exactly how it was supposed to be because I never found the dress really. The dress found me.