So today as I'm playing hooky (well, a mental health day really saves my colleagues from being unfortunate witnesses of my emotional combustion and its outward effects) I decided to take it easy and not do much. Too bad my brain is still working on overdrive. I happened to stumble upon this post in this blog, A Practical Wedding, which addressed the age-old question: "What is it about human nature that forces us to strive for the best?"
As I'm well on my way to becoming an expert researcher as well as learning new things on the path towards my information science degree, I find myself having a hard time with what we call Satisficing, that is, stopping your research when you find answers that are adequate. People probably practice satisficing on a daily basis - looking for a definition of a word: check ONE dictionary, click on the FIRST link of your Google hit, etc. The answer there is adequate. There will be variant descriptions from all types of dictionaries and sources, but they'll all mean the same. So you stop looking. Satisfied.
When applied to other things that require more research, more importance, more authoritative warrant (OMG I'm not at work, am I?) this is when satisficing becomes difficult. When do you stop? How "good" is "good enough" when compared to the "best"?
According to the post mentioned above, the best is the enemy of the good (translated Voltaire quote). Things that we find good are often still not good enough as we search for the best. Human nature. But WHY? And once we happen upon the best, how do we know it, since we are always looking for something better than what we've got? The good get shafted and everyone loses.
I'm glad I found this post. And perhaps I'm making your brain crazy with too much thinking. I know mine is kicking me for doing this on a hooky day. But I'm glad I found this post because it alleviates the pressure I have on myself to find the Best flowers, the Best photographer, the Best dress, the Best.... To me, the Best means the cheapest for the greatest quality AND quantity (yeah, in an ideal world, huh?!). For example, a lone element does not determine the Best: roses, orchids, delphinium, or whatever we choose to match our colors, but they better be damn affordable for ALL the flowers we need or else they aren't the Best. Then it becomes a vicious cycle: can another florist do it cheaper? Are there alternative flowers that LOOK like what we want? What if we use less blooms and add more filler? What if we change the flowers altogether because these aren't the Best?
This doesn't only apply to objects and money, however. The tendency to over-think, over-research, over-analyze things are all part of the insatiable desire to be better, to be perfect. It was difficult for me to take a sick day today because we have visitors at work and I was planning on attending a couple of their presentations this afternoon. And I'm not unwell, at least on the outside. But as I lolled around in bed dreading waking up, getting ready, going through the motions, being hormonally imbalanced, analyzing life's too many social issues, I decided to give myself a break. I decided to break my perfect attendance record. I decided to play hooky, if you can call it that, as I'm actually and obviously unwell in the head. I decided to spend some QT with my Sammie, and she sits in my lap as I type. I decided to not be around people today.
Is that OK? Is that Good? Or is that the Best thing to do?
While you ponder that, take a look at photographer Miguel Mayo's website. We are having our free engagement session done with him in a couple of weekends. He isn't the Best of everyone I've found, but he's GOOD. Good enough? I'm beginning to think so. (The e-session is free and his full-coverage photography packages start at $1,500, a steal by comparison.) He might actually end up being the Best.. if Best is what we want...?
Perhaps redefining "good" and "best" is what I should do next... after all, I've always believed that "all adjectives are relative."
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Wedding Dress Fitting, Take 1
So I managed to NOT clean the apartment and NOT send out my STDs. Way to go, me. What happened to those two weeks I said I was going to get this stuff done? I wonder if that means I'm going to be a procrastinating bride who runs late and then yells at everyone for not helping her be on time. ;) Probably not.
Last Friday, I was out in Granada Hills for a work retreat luncheon thingy and it was 115 degrees outside when we left at 3:00pm. WOWZERS, was it hot! As I drove home it even dared to go up to 116 on my car temp gauge, and I felt sorry for the man I passed whose truck had broken down. He was literally on his back on the side of the freeway, giant tummy exposed, underneath his truck, trying to fix something. I was too far over in the fast lanes to pull over, but all I could have done anyway was give him hot bottled water from my trunk.
The heat was really getting to me despite the a/c on full blast, so I started to almost doze off at the wheel. I didn't have any other plans so I was heading home and thought about passing out on the couch with the a/c cranked and fan blowing. As I wilted in my seat, I thought about which exit to take, and realized I would be passing the Burbank mall, and it would be nice and air conditioned in there. So I shook the sleep off my face and exited early to get to the mall. I had to get a gift for the couple whose wedding I'm attending next month as a guest of a friend (the first wedding I'm going to without Rick!).
I don't know if it was the heat or that I had too much caffeine and sugar at the luncheon, but I didn't feel well as I stumbled through the mall, indecisively. Almost like I had low blood sugar and was going to pass out, but was perfectly fine, coherent, just couldn't make up my mind about anything. I walked around the mall aimlessly like a lost child, not knowing what I was looking for, and not remembering what I was there to buy. I ended up getting a strawberry smoothie and that helped, and my consciousness regained.
On my way back to the car, I passed by this huge store in the mall - the size of 5 stores (or two Forever21s) - and saw inside racks of flower girl dresses, formal gowns, and... wedding dresses! So in I went, brave little lonesome me, thinking this was the day I would try on my dress AND buy it! All by myself!
I first browsed the flower girl dresses. They were sooo cute. And very affordable too! Nice fabrics, classic designs, and almost all of them cost less than $40. Wow. This store was like a bridal salon mixed with discount dresses impeccably arranged. The formal bridesmaid and MOB gowns were a bit dated in style; most of them were long and sheath-like, and the fabrics were mainly that stick-to-you satin that I detest. They also had no dark browns. So I kept walking, walking towards the back, where racks of white and ivory dresses hung in thick clear plastic bags that screamed "I'm SPECIAL, don't touch me!"
As I browsed each and every design (and there were seriously, like, only one or two sizes of each design, a 4 or 6 and/or a 10 or 14), I got excited. There were so many really beaded and beautiful dresses! And on top of that, there were a lot of name brand ones there too! Now, I'm not an haute couture type of dresser, nor am I a trendy trendsetter or a label snob, but I really didn't think this "mall store" would have Maggie Sottero or Mori Lee dresses in its collection. I mean, seriously. And on top of that, they were, in my opinion, reasonably priced! The most expensive dress I saw was $1,100, which is also David's Bridals' most expensive (but it's David's Bridals!).
So I made my rounds through the four racks a couple of times and was mentally saving the dresses I wanted to try on, even the $700, out-of-my-budget ones. I didn't care! I was excited! Plus, the only time I had tried on dresses was in January at a David's Bridal, and spent 3 hours in there having to wait for "help," and only being able to try on 3 dresses before I gave up and left, frustrated that I was only able to choose dresses from their 20 page catalog, not allowed to browse the racks, and stood in one dress for 45 minutes as the salesladies puttered around moving TVs (yeah, that's a whole 'nother story). Of course, after the visit, I got unending phone calls, voice mails, and emails to come back for another visit and how is the planning going, we'd like to sell you some essential accessories, and even though you said you don't want a veil, we'll still try to sell you 3 different lengths for an extra poufy veil look.
Anyways, back to the racks. A woman saw me looking at the dresses and came up to me with a frown, and said, "Can I help you?" And I looked at her, caught by surprise with the un-warm greeting, and said, "ohh.. I.. uh, I'm just looking." She gave me a once-over, and obvious once-over, and said, "When's the wedding?" and when I told her, she said, "Ok, you can look. But you have to make an appointment if you want to try any on." And turned away before I could acknowledge (and thank) her.
Nice. That was hot. I felt like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, tears streaming down my face, wads of green clutched in my hands, exclaiming, "I have money, I HAVE MONEY, and no one will help me, and I need a dress, and I HAVE ALL THIS MONEY!!!" (except I wasn't crying, and I had only plastic, not paper.) I looked down at myself, observed my Target flip flops, knee length denim shorts, and black camisole tank top. Did I look that awful? Or did I look that young that I didn't deserve to be able to try on wedding dresses? I don't know. I refused to be off-put by the woman, however, and continued browsing. Hey, she didn't say I had to pay to look.
I found one that I really wanted to try on. I went to the register (which took practically a minute to walk to) and asked the lady behind the counter if I could try on one dress. She was young-ish with a naive face, and looked around. She looked uncertain and scared. Hmm. She seemed to be at a loss for words, so I piped, "A woman told me I had to make an appointment, but I was wondering if I could just try one on today." In the whole store there were probably 4 customers in there. Hardly too busy to not let me try on ONE dress, right? Come on, guys.
She kept looking around and not answering me, and I thought, geez, this girl's scared of her boss. Great. She finally said, "Yes, um, you have to make an appointment." So I relented. What I really wanted was for her to say, "Ok, let me go see what I can do for you." And I was thisclose to saying, "I'll go find that witchy woman and ask her if I can try on ONE dress." I made an appointment for the following day. And thought maybe I could get my sister to come with me, so it was all ok.
My sister actually was able to come with me the next day, and she even brought baby Bella. As a matter of fact, this is what Bella looks like now, at 13 weeks. :)
As we walked through the mall back to the store, I thought out loud, "I bet it's going to be that same damn woman who's going to end up helping us today." And sure enough... I walked to the cashier and told her we had an appointment to try on dresses, she left us standing there while she went to go notify the woman and we stood there stupidly. So of course, we started browsing again. I pulled two dresses that I wanted to try on and put them on the rack by the dressing rooms. Finally the woman shows up to "greet" us in the wedding gown aisles and I'm ready for her this time! Well, not really. I mumbled that I was her 3:00 appointment, something something. She asked me again when the wedding date was (why that is so important to keep asking as the first question, I don't know) and then what kind of dress I wanted. A-HA. I was ready to answer her:
Sweetheart or regular strapless neckline or V-neck sleeveless; slight A-line, maybe trumpet if it will look good, and with a train.
She stared at my body, thought a bit, and said, "Ok. You pick two dresses, I pick two dresses, and that's all we're doing today."
I saw the reaction on my sister's face and was tempted to either reciprocate or elbow her in the stomach. I didn't want to piss this lady off; I still wanted to try on these dresses without feeling confrontational, and if this is what we had to put up with, then so be it. Hey, it doesn't mean I have to buy from her, and it's only my real first dress shopping!
There was more rough-around-the-edges talk, as my sister tried to pull in a chair into the fitting room with the baby stroller... the woman said she would be helping me so my sister didn't have to come in, and also it was too hot in there and she didn't need a chair. This pissed my sister off even more than she was already. We all fit comfortably, and it really wasn't THAT hot in there; only the woman got hot as she had to manhandle the 15-pound dresses and throw them over my head. I personally think that gets more makeup on the inside of the dresses; I have no hips so it would be easier for everyone if I could just step inside the dresses. But anyways...
The first dress she picked for me was hideous. Well, I guess I shouldn't say HIDEOUS because it did come out BEAUTIFULLY on me. On the hanger, the bodice was ornately beaded, ruched and pulled to the side, and encrusted in diamonds. And it looked expensive and mermaid-y. I *sigh*ed and decided to try it; my sister, knowing my personality and customary inability to tell people what I want and don't want, piped up, "Do you want to try those on? I don't think you'll like them." And I responded to the both of them, "Yes, I'll try it." And I heard my sister mutter under her breath, "since she only gets to try on FOUR, we don't want to waste a try on something she knows she doesn't like." The woman had her back turned and didn't respond. But I think she heard.
It was a nice dress. As the woman was lacing up the back (something that I knew I didn't want because it looks messy back there and I like the streamlined look of buttons with a hidden zipper underneath), she stopped and said, "I have to ask before I continue because if I don't ask people get mad." And I looked at her reflection in the mirror as she was talking and I didn't understand. She went on, "because I'm going to start pulling this tight and if you don't tell me not to pull too tight, how am I supposed to know." And I still didn't know what she was talking about, so I started to say, "okay, you can pull tight.." and she continued, "because sometimes girls come in here and they all have different body types and I can't tell sometimes.." and then I understood what she was getting at, and in realization of it, laughed and said, "No, I'm NOT pregnant, cinch as tight as you want!"
So off she went, cinching and pulling, and I have no idea what it looks like from the back doing that sort of thing, but I felt like a British countess being corsetted in by attendants before heading to the parlor to greet a possible suitor who came calling on me. I waited patiently as the breath was pushed out my lungs down into my stomach or up into my head. But oh, how I watched my waist disappear in the mirror! I hated the dress only because it had an asymmetrical design in the ruching, which gathered into a giant cluster of rhinestone decoration two inches left of my crotch. Why did they have to ruin a good dress by doing that? Of course it LOOKS ok. But my OCD complex would not have it. I walked out into the main dressing area and stood on the dress block and looked into the mirror ahead of me. Niiice. I did feel like a princess. But wait - was this the look I was going for?
Through the years of looking at bridal magazines and imagining myself in lavish wedding gowns, I had come to realize that it is highly impractical to wear such overly stated things. It may be the bride's day (edit: the bride AND groom's day) but no one stays perched perfectly at the edge of a settee for 10 hours or stands against a wall with her hip jutted out, arms slightly open like Cinderella. Those magazine photos are outrageously impractical. It's not like I'm going to be standing on a pedestal the whole day of the wedding, looking pretty while pouting with half-closed smokey eyes, and frozen in time like a sculpture. Heck no! I anticipate running around, rolling around in the grass, taking lots of fun photos, and dancing until my feet break off. Well, okay, maybe not rolling in the grass. That would be the day after. ;)
This was the first dress:
(Maggie Sottero Coco, $720)
So off that dress went. I tried on four others (the woman pulled a fifth that she wanted me to try) so by the end of that, I was hanging on to her every word, roughness and all. She actually kind of grew on me. And she never tried to sell me anything, get me to buy an expensive dress, or make me change my likes/dislikes in what I wanted. She merely gave me her opinion, good and bad, about what would look best on my body, and she really did have my best intentions at heart (it was almost like having my mother there.. but she was a professional wedding gown fitter). Things she said included, "That looks okay, you look fine. But okay and fine are not good enough," "No, no, no... take that off, no. That doesn't show anything, nothing good about that dress," and my favorite, which she kept repeating, driving home the point, "You need to get a dress that ties up in the back, for more control. You can even fit into a size 2, prettier to see the ribbon ties that way, looks nice, and you have most control than a zipper." I like the size 2 part. And that also meant I didn't have to worry about alterations for the wedding - the corset back would take care of me gaining or losing weight!
The other dresses paled in comparison to the first. The two that I had picked, an empire waist, notched neckline strapless gown, and a strapless mermaid/trumpet (couldn't tell on the hanger) with a plain front except for beading at the sweetheart neckline, were awful on my body. The fifth dress the woman pulled for me to try was a pick-up skirt ballgown. I hate pick-up skirts. I looked like an effing cake. But she tsk-tsked at me and said that since I was not wearing heels for the wedding, this way I wouldn't have to cut the dress, I simply, PICK UP, or pinch, equal parts around the dress and secure the spots, which pull it up the hem. Very smart, this woman was. Really made up for her brusque manner.
But here are examples of a pick-up skirt; this is for you if you love cake so much that you feel a need to look like one on your wedding day:
(Destinations by Maggie Sottero SD3006)
(Maggie Sottero Emme)
But I shan't get ahead of myself and make this post a rant about fashionable and popular designs. After all, who am I to judge fashion????!
After the fittings, she lead me to the front of the store and pulled out Maggie Sottero catalogs, told me to go through them and write down the ones that I would look good in. It almost felt like a test! Like, now that we've had our lesson, here's a test. Don't forget what I've taught you today! She obviously had no intention of making me buy any of her dresses, and encouraged me to go to other stores and try different styles but to remember this was what looked best on me. She told me to try to find something similar to what I had tried on, to NOT look just at the brand names, and feel the material, no matter what it was really made of. I left there feeling very happy, a satisfied customer (who paid nothing), and thanked her sincerely. Her face had been bright red in the fitting room from helping me dress and undress, but by then her colors had returned to normal. I don't think she smiled the whole entire time. I don't even know if she had teeth. But she said, "You're welcome" as many times as I said thanks, and that was good enough for me.
So here is what I'm looking for:
One-piece, sweetheart neckline, ruched EVEN bodice (not asymmetrical), natural waist, corset (or tie-up or lace-up) back, beading mainly on bodice, and chapel train.
Things to avoid: all-over beading and lace (she said, "too messy"), empire or basque waist delineation (she said, "too long-waisted"), smooth-paneled bodice (she said, "shows your skin" and "creases", aka my fat) and asymmetry (because I don't like it).
This is closest, but doesn't have the train length:
(Maggie Sottero Irina)
And I might be able to force myself to be ok with the asymmetry of this:
(Maggie Sottero Ariana Taffeta)
Last Friday, I was out in Granada Hills for a work retreat luncheon thingy and it was 115 degrees outside when we left at 3:00pm. WOWZERS, was it hot! As I drove home it even dared to go up to 116 on my car temp gauge, and I felt sorry for the man I passed whose truck had broken down. He was literally on his back on the side of the freeway, giant tummy exposed, underneath his truck, trying to fix something. I was too far over in the fast lanes to pull over, but all I could have done anyway was give him hot bottled water from my trunk.
The heat was really getting to me despite the a/c on full blast, so I started to almost doze off at the wheel. I didn't have any other plans so I was heading home and thought about passing out on the couch with the a/c cranked and fan blowing. As I wilted in my seat, I thought about which exit to take, and realized I would be passing the Burbank mall, and it would be nice and air conditioned in there. So I shook the sleep off my face and exited early to get to the mall. I had to get a gift for the couple whose wedding I'm attending next month as a guest of a friend (the first wedding I'm going to without Rick!).
I don't know if it was the heat or that I had too much caffeine and sugar at the luncheon, but I didn't feel well as I stumbled through the mall, indecisively. Almost like I had low blood sugar and was going to pass out, but was perfectly fine, coherent, just couldn't make up my mind about anything. I walked around the mall aimlessly like a lost child, not knowing what I was looking for, and not remembering what I was there to buy. I ended up getting a strawberry smoothie and that helped, and my consciousness regained.
On my way back to the car, I passed by this huge store in the mall - the size of 5 stores (or two Forever21s) - and saw inside racks of flower girl dresses, formal gowns, and... wedding dresses! So in I went, brave little lonesome me, thinking this was the day I would try on my dress AND buy it! All by myself!
I first browsed the flower girl dresses. They were sooo cute. And very affordable too! Nice fabrics, classic designs, and almost all of them cost less than $40. Wow. This store was like a bridal salon mixed with discount dresses impeccably arranged. The formal bridesmaid and MOB gowns were a bit dated in style; most of them were long and sheath-like, and the fabrics were mainly that stick-to-you satin that I detest. They also had no dark browns. So I kept walking, walking towards the back, where racks of white and ivory dresses hung in thick clear plastic bags that screamed "I'm SPECIAL, don't touch me!"
As I browsed each and every design (and there were seriously, like, only one or two sizes of each design, a 4 or 6 and/or a 10 or 14), I got excited. There were so many really beaded and beautiful dresses! And on top of that, there were a lot of name brand ones there too! Now, I'm not an haute couture type of dresser, nor am I a trendy trendsetter or a label snob, but I really didn't think this "mall store" would have Maggie Sottero or Mori Lee dresses in its collection. I mean, seriously. And on top of that, they were, in my opinion, reasonably priced! The most expensive dress I saw was $1,100, which is also David's Bridals' most expensive (but it's David's Bridals!).
So I made my rounds through the four racks a couple of times and was mentally saving the dresses I wanted to try on, even the $700, out-of-my-budget ones. I didn't care! I was excited! Plus, the only time I had tried on dresses was in January at a David's Bridal, and spent 3 hours in there having to wait for "help," and only being able to try on 3 dresses before I gave up and left, frustrated that I was only able to choose dresses from their 20 page catalog, not allowed to browse the racks, and stood in one dress for 45 minutes as the salesladies puttered around moving TVs (yeah, that's a whole 'nother story). Of course, after the visit, I got unending phone calls, voice mails, and emails to come back for another visit and how is the planning going, we'd like to sell you some essential accessories, and even though you said you don't want a veil, we'll still try to sell you 3 different lengths for an extra poufy veil look.
Anyways, back to the racks. A woman saw me looking at the dresses and came up to me with a frown, and said, "Can I help you?" And I looked at her, caught by surprise with the un-warm greeting, and said, "ohh.. I.. uh, I'm just looking." She gave me a once-over, and obvious once-over, and said, "When's the wedding?" and when I told her, she said, "Ok, you can look. But you have to make an appointment if you want to try any on." And turned away before I could acknowledge (and thank) her.
Nice. That was hot. I felt like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, tears streaming down my face, wads of green clutched in my hands, exclaiming, "I have money, I HAVE MONEY, and no one will help me, and I need a dress, and I HAVE ALL THIS MONEY!!!" (except I wasn't crying, and I had only plastic, not paper.) I looked down at myself, observed my Target flip flops, knee length denim shorts, and black camisole tank top. Did I look that awful? Or did I look that young that I didn't deserve to be able to try on wedding dresses? I don't know. I refused to be off-put by the woman, however, and continued browsing. Hey, she didn't say I had to pay to look.
I found one that I really wanted to try on. I went to the register (which took practically a minute to walk to) and asked the lady behind the counter if I could try on one dress. She was young-ish with a naive face, and looked around. She looked uncertain and scared. Hmm. She seemed to be at a loss for words, so I piped, "A woman told me I had to make an appointment, but I was wondering if I could just try one on today." In the whole store there were probably 4 customers in there. Hardly too busy to not let me try on ONE dress, right? Come on, guys.
She kept looking around and not answering me, and I thought, geez, this girl's scared of her boss. Great. She finally said, "Yes, um, you have to make an appointment." So I relented. What I really wanted was for her to say, "Ok, let me go see what I can do for you." And I was thisclose to saying, "I'll go find that witchy woman and ask her if I can try on ONE dress." I made an appointment for the following day. And thought maybe I could get my sister to come with me, so it was all ok.
My sister actually was able to come with me the next day, and she even brought baby Bella. As a matter of fact, this is what Bella looks like now, at 13 weeks. :)
As we walked through the mall back to the store, I thought out loud, "I bet it's going to be that same damn woman who's going to end up helping us today." And sure enough... I walked to the cashier and told her we had an appointment to try on dresses, she left us standing there while she went to go notify the woman and we stood there stupidly. So of course, we started browsing again. I pulled two dresses that I wanted to try on and put them on the rack by the dressing rooms. Finally the woman shows up to "greet" us in the wedding gown aisles and I'm ready for her this time! Well, not really. I mumbled that I was her 3:00 appointment, something something. She asked me again when the wedding date was (why that is so important to keep asking as the first question, I don't know) and then what kind of dress I wanted. A-HA. I was ready to answer her:
Sweetheart or regular strapless neckline or V-neck sleeveless; slight A-line, maybe trumpet if it will look good, and with a train.
She stared at my body, thought a bit, and said, "Ok. You pick two dresses, I pick two dresses, and that's all we're doing today."
I saw the reaction on my sister's face and was tempted to either reciprocate or elbow her in the stomach. I didn't want to piss this lady off; I still wanted to try on these dresses without feeling confrontational, and if this is what we had to put up with, then so be it. Hey, it doesn't mean I have to buy from her, and it's only my real first dress shopping!
There was more rough-around-the-edges talk, as my sister tried to pull in a chair into the fitting room with the baby stroller... the woman said she would be helping me so my sister didn't have to come in, and also it was too hot in there and she didn't need a chair. This pissed my sister off even more than she was already. We all fit comfortably, and it really wasn't THAT hot in there; only the woman got hot as she had to manhandle the 15-pound dresses and throw them over my head. I personally think that gets more makeup on the inside of the dresses; I have no hips so it would be easier for everyone if I could just step inside the dresses. But anyways...
The first dress she picked for me was hideous. Well, I guess I shouldn't say HIDEOUS because it did come out BEAUTIFULLY on me. On the hanger, the bodice was ornately beaded, ruched and pulled to the side, and encrusted in diamonds. And it looked expensive and mermaid-y. I *sigh*ed and decided to try it; my sister, knowing my personality and customary inability to tell people what I want and don't want, piped up, "Do you want to try those on? I don't think you'll like them." And I responded to the both of them, "Yes, I'll try it." And I heard my sister mutter under her breath, "since she only gets to try on FOUR, we don't want to waste a try on something she knows she doesn't like." The woman had her back turned and didn't respond. But I think she heard.
It was a nice dress. As the woman was lacing up the back (something that I knew I didn't want because it looks messy back there and I like the streamlined look of buttons with a hidden zipper underneath), she stopped and said, "I have to ask before I continue because if I don't ask people get mad." And I looked at her reflection in the mirror as she was talking and I didn't understand. She went on, "because I'm going to start pulling this tight and if you don't tell me not to pull too tight, how am I supposed to know." And I still didn't know what she was talking about, so I started to say, "okay, you can pull tight.." and she continued, "because sometimes girls come in here and they all have different body types and I can't tell sometimes.." and then I understood what she was getting at, and in realization of it, laughed and said, "No, I'm NOT pregnant, cinch as tight as you want!"
So off she went, cinching and pulling, and I have no idea what it looks like from the back doing that sort of thing, but I felt like a British countess being corsetted in by attendants before heading to the parlor to greet a possible suitor who came calling on me. I waited patiently as the breath was pushed out my lungs down into my stomach or up into my head. But oh, how I watched my waist disappear in the mirror! I hated the dress only because it had an asymmetrical design in the ruching, which gathered into a giant cluster of rhinestone decoration two inches left of my crotch. Why did they have to ruin a good dress by doing that? Of course it LOOKS ok. But my OCD complex would not have it. I walked out into the main dressing area and stood on the dress block and looked into the mirror ahead of me. Niiice. I did feel like a princess. But wait - was this the look I was going for?
Through the years of looking at bridal magazines and imagining myself in lavish wedding gowns, I had come to realize that it is highly impractical to wear such overly stated things. It may be the bride's day (edit: the bride AND groom's day) but no one stays perched perfectly at the edge of a settee for 10 hours or stands against a wall with her hip jutted out, arms slightly open like Cinderella. Those magazine photos are outrageously impractical. It's not like I'm going to be standing on a pedestal the whole day of the wedding, looking pretty while pouting with half-closed smokey eyes, and frozen in time like a sculpture. Heck no! I anticipate running around, rolling around in the grass, taking lots of fun photos, and dancing until my feet break off. Well, okay, maybe not rolling in the grass. That would be the day after. ;)
This was the first dress:
(Maggie Sottero Coco, $720)So off that dress went. I tried on four others (the woman pulled a fifth that she wanted me to try) so by the end of that, I was hanging on to her every word, roughness and all. She actually kind of grew on me. And she never tried to sell me anything, get me to buy an expensive dress, or make me change my likes/dislikes in what I wanted. She merely gave me her opinion, good and bad, about what would look best on my body, and she really did have my best intentions at heart (it was almost like having my mother there.. but she was a professional wedding gown fitter). Things she said included, "That looks okay, you look fine. But okay and fine are not good enough," "No, no, no... take that off, no. That doesn't show anything, nothing good about that dress," and my favorite, which she kept repeating, driving home the point, "You need to get a dress that ties up in the back, for more control. You can even fit into a size 2, prettier to see the ribbon ties that way, looks nice, and you have most control than a zipper." I like the size 2 part. And that also meant I didn't have to worry about alterations for the wedding - the corset back would take care of me gaining or losing weight!
The other dresses paled in comparison to the first. The two that I had picked, an empire waist, notched neckline strapless gown, and a strapless mermaid/trumpet (couldn't tell on the hanger) with a plain front except for beading at the sweetheart neckline, were awful on my body. The fifth dress the woman pulled for me to try was a pick-up skirt ballgown. I hate pick-up skirts. I looked like an effing cake. But she tsk-tsked at me and said that since I was not wearing heels for the wedding, this way I wouldn't have to cut the dress, I simply, PICK UP, or pinch, equal parts around the dress and secure the spots, which pull it up the hem. Very smart, this woman was. Really made up for her brusque manner.
But here are examples of a pick-up skirt; this is for you if you love cake so much that you feel a need to look like one on your wedding day:
(Destinations by Maggie Sottero SD3006)
(Maggie Sottero Emme)But I shan't get ahead of myself and make this post a rant about fashionable and popular designs. After all, who am I to judge fashion????!
After the fittings, she lead me to the front of the store and pulled out Maggie Sottero catalogs, told me to go through them and write down the ones that I would look good in. It almost felt like a test! Like, now that we've had our lesson, here's a test. Don't forget what I've taught you today! She obviously had no intention of making me buy any of her dresses, and encouraged me to go to other stores and try different styles but to remember this was what looked best on me. She told me to try to find something similar to what I had tried on, to NOT look just at the brand names, and feel the material, no matter what it was really made of. I left there feeling very happy, a satisfied customer (who paid nothing), and thanked her sincerely. Her face had been bright red in the fitting room from helping me dress and undress, but by then her colors had returned to normal. I don't think she smiled the whole entire time. I don't even know if she had teeth. But she said, "You're welcome" as many times as I said thanks, and that was good enough for me.
So here is what I'm looking for:
One-piece, sweetheart neckline, ruched EVEN bodice (not asymmetrical), natural waist, corset (or tie-up or lace-up) back, beading mainly on bodice, and chapel train.
Things to avoid: all-over beading and lace (she said, "too messy"), empire or basque waist delineation (she said, "too long-waisted"), smooth-paneled bodice (she said, "shows your skin" and "creases", aka my fat) and asymmetry (because I don't like it).
This is closest, but doesn't have the train length:
(Maggie Sottero Irina)And I might be able to force myself to be ok with the asymmetry of this:
(Maggie Sottero Ariana Taffeta)
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
2nd week of break...
Ahhh, June 17. I've combatted my stupid 2-month-long rash outbreak of eczema. Finally broke down and went to Urgent Care on Saturday and got oral corticosteroid pills and steroid cream. And 3 months' worth of Claritin. My skin is super happy, at least for now.
So what have I done lately? Not much. Peddled around the house, stayed indoors from the heat. Although I have made some really pretty coffee filter roses, pattern taken from Martha Stewart and originally designed by Mommy Makes Roses. So pretty.
I've also resumed my quest for a wedding photographer. Everyone is so expensive, and I'm so picky about what I want now that I've done research and seen what types of photography is out there and what kinds of artistic shots and effects some really great photographers do. But of course, the really great photojournalist photographers cost half our whole wedding budget. So out that goes. *sigh*
Researching and learning is heartbreaking. Because then you come to realize that you can't afford the best and what you are forced to settle with doesn't compare to that perfection you witnessed - and even though what you're settling with is probably decent, you've already been exposed to something better. What is with human nature and the unsatiable desire to have the best and be unsatisfied with the mediocre?
This is who I found that I have deemed "the best" for our wedding so far in my research. She's already booked for our wedding date and didn't tell me how much she charges: Nataly Lemus. Every picture that she takes (at least the ones that she posts) is a piece of art itself. The shots are aesthetically composed and balanced, and the retouched effects she adds afterwards are beautiful.
And of course, Greg Bumatay of Bumatay Studio was the first photographer I happened to stumble upon. And of course, he's way out of our budget. But his photography and style are oh so hot.
And by association, Miguel Pola, again out of our budget. But a bit more affordable.
And also Desi Baytan. His basic package starts at $1,500, which is totally awesome.
Next to check out is Sandra P. Photography. She's a friend of someone who Rick and I went to high school with, and maybe we can swing a deal with her. Without totally asking for a favor from a person I used to know. One of my pet peeves is getting a note from someone from my past life only when they want something - and then after they get it never contact me again.. So I wish to NOT be a hypocrite about that. (hi Austin!)
What's so great about these photographers is I can see that they can take anything - a detail, a moment, a venue - that is possibly lackluster and banal and make it look beautiful. A warped box of Cracker jacks comes out looking elegant in muted tones, in off-centered, crooked shot. Other photographers (or simply a person with a point and shoot camera such as myself) would have taken a macro shot of it in full color and be done with it. Why is this important? Because I've seen some beautiful places in person that don't photograph well if done in an amateurish sort of way, and some pretty ugly places that translate horribly into square shots; our ceremony and reception sites run the risk of this and despite that people who are at the wedding will see these places in person, I'd like to remember our sites as beautifully as I can.
I'm also re-addicted to Wicked and its soundtrack, and am now starting to read the book, which I have had in my possession for over 3 years and failed to pick up the hefty 2-inch fat volume. I read a little bit every night before bedtime and hopefully will have finished it by the end of the month. :) I want to get tickets to see it again, and maybe have Rick take his mom for her birthday next month.
I guess that's it for now. Oh, and I got an A in my last class. Whoo hoo!
So what have I done lately? Not much. Peddled around the house, stayed indoors from the heat. Although I have made some really pretty coffee filter roses, pattern taken from Martha Stewart and originally designed by Mommy Makes Roses. So pretty.
I've also resumed my quest for a wedding photographer. Everyone is so expensive, and I'm so picky about what I want now that I've done research and seen what types of photography is out there and what kinds of artistic shots and effects some really great photographers do. But of course, the really great photojournalist photographers cost half our whole wedding budget. So out that goes. *sigh*
Researching and learning is heartbreaking. Because then you come to realize that you can't afford the best and what you are forced to settle with doesn't compare to that perfection you witnessed - and even though what you're settling with is probably decent, you've already been exposed to something better. What is with human nature and the unsatiable desire to have the best and be unsatisfied with the mediocre?
This is who I found that I have deemed "the best" for our wedding so far in my research. She's already booked for our wedding date and didn't tell me how much she charges: Nataly Lemus. Every picture that she takes (at least the ones that she posts) is a piece of art itself. The shots are aesthetically composed and balanced, and the retouched effects she adds afterwards are beautiful.
And of course, Greg Bumatay of Bumatay Studio was the first photographer I happened to stumble upon. And of course, he's way out of our budget. But his photography and style are oh so hot.
And by association, Miguel Pola, again out of our budget. But a bit more affordable.
And also Desi Baytan. His basic package starts at $1,500, which is totally awesome.
Next to check out is Sandra P. Photography. She's a friend of someone who Rick and I went to high school with, and maybe we can swing a deal with her. Without totally asking for a favor from a person I used to know. One of my pet peeves is getting a note from someone from my past life only when they want something - and then after they get it never contact me again.. So I wish to NOT be a hypocrite about that. (hi Austin!)
What's so great about these photographers is I can see that they can take anything - a detail, a moment, a venue - that is possibly lackluster and banal and make it look beautiful. A warped box of Cracker jacks comes out looking elegant in muted tones, in off-centered, crooked shot. Other photographers (or simply a person with a point and shoot camera such as myself) would have taken a macro shot of it in full color and be done with it. Why is this important? Because I've seen some beautiful places in person that don't photograph well if done in an amateurish sort of way, and some pretty ugly places that translate horribly into square shots; our ceremony and reception sites run the risk of this and despite that people who are at the wedding will see these places in person, I'd like to remember our sites as beautifully as I can.
I'm also re-addicted to Wicked and its soundtrack, and am now starting to read the book, which I have had in my possession for over 3 years and failed to pick up the hefty 2-inch fat volume. I read a little bit every night before bedtime and hopefully will have finished it by the end of the month. :) I want to get tickets to see it again, and maybe have Rick take his mom for her birthday next month.
I guess that's it for now. Oh, and I got an A in my last class. Whoo hoo!
Monday, June 2, 2008
6 Days to Relief!
Wow, it's been a month since my last post. It's been a month since Ah-Gong's funeral.
Six more grueling days to finish my final project for this quarter. SIX DAYS. I should be really happy, but I'm also stressed out because I'm only 15% of the way through. After Sunday, (and it WILL come unless the apocalypse comes first) I will be FREE for TWO WEEKS!! Two wonderfully-free-but-riddled-with-relative-visits-and/or-get-togethers-with-friends weeks until summer school starts. And then the 10-week cycle of hormonal imbalance and stressed craziness continues.
I've already decided what to accomplish during my two weeks' break. It's kind of sad that I have goals during break, but the only way to take full advantage of playtime is to have schedules! ;)
1. I will get my Save-the-Date cards finished and sent out.
2. I will NOT spend every Saturday and Sunday entertaining family friends and relatives. Unless I want to. (read: unless I HAVE to and try to tell myself that I have a choice in the matter and I should approach the situation this way.)
3. I will relax and watch lots of summer movies. Indy, Wall-E, and whatever comes out that looks good will get my $12 patronage. :)
4. I will get organized and clean the apartment from top to bottom. I realize that the end of each quarter is stressful not only because of the final projects due, but because I'm trying to work in putrid, squalid conditions at home. Funny how entropy really does increase. Maybe I should throw a hissy fit and blame Rick for not helping out around the house. Studentzilla rears her ugly head once again! AHAHHAA.
I can't believe it's June already. I'm totally caught off guard and have no to-do list drafted in my mind yet!!
Well. I guess this is the end of my boring post. It seems my life is a little lackluster right now, which I guess is totally okay. :) No news is good news, right?
Six more grueling days to finish my final project for this quarter. SIX DAYS. I should be really happy, but I'm also stressed out because I'm only 15% of the way through. After Sunday, (and it WILL come unless the apocalypse comes first) I will be FREE for TWO WEEKS!! Two wonderfully-free-but-riddled-with-relative-visits-and/or-get-togethers-with-friends weeks until summer school starts. And then the 10-week cycle of hormonal imbalance and stressed craziness continues.
I've already decided what to accomplish during my two weeks' break. It's kind of sad that I have goals during break, but the only way to take full advantage of playtime is to have schedules! ;)
1. I will get my Save-the-Date cards finished and sent out.
2. I will NOT spend every Saturday and Sunday entertaining family friends and relatives. Unless I want to. (read: unless I HAVE to and try to tell myself that I have a choice in the matter and I should approach the situation this way.)
3. I will relax and watch lots of summer movies. Indy, Wall-E, and whatever comes out that looks good will get my $12 patronage. :)
4. I will get organized and clean the apartment from top to bottom. I realize that the end of each quarter is stressful not only because of the final projects due, but because I'm trying to work in putrid, squalid conditions at home. Funny how entropy really does increase. Maybe I should throw a hissy fit and blame Rick for not helping out around the house. Studentzilla rears her ugly head once again! AHAHHAA.
I can't believe it's June already. I'm totally caught off guard and have no to-do list drafted in my mind yet!!
Well. I guess this is the end of my boring post. It seems my life is a little lackluster right now, which I guess is totally okay. :) No news is good news, right?
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Closing doors
I’m blogging this lovely Sunday morning because after yesterday’s ordeal, I’m a mix of emotions: anger, frustration, futility, resentment, sadness. At least for once I’m not having an identity crisis.
Ah-Gong’s funeral was yesterday. I spent the day not thinking about it, Rick and I ran errands in the morning, and I took an hour and a half to get ready. Upon arriving at the funeral site with my sister and brother-in-law, I greeted my father and other relatives at the door of the chapel. I wasn’t nervous; rather, confident, because I was looking good and I guess had the intention of looking like the 27-year-old woman that I am to people I hadn’t seen in over 10 years. It was almost like a high school reunion where you show up looking like you’re accepting an award, and people look at you and marvel at how much you’ve changed since high school when you were a dumpy nerd with knobby knees. It didn’t work in my favor yesterday that I look very much like my mother.
The service was interesting. I’d somehow forgotten that, duh, the whole thing would be in Chinese, and surprisingly, I understood about 80% of it all. Go me. Although I wished I hadn’t understood that much. What was said wasn’t all that nice, a little self-indulgent on the ministers’ parts (of course, touting that this was God’s message and Ah-Gong was a saint), and very over-the-top preachery in a loud and dramatic way. I remembered why I never liked Chinese church, and especially why I stopped going to Chinese church in the first place. These people are pieces of work. I wondered if I was in a cult.
Grandma asked us to be in the receiving line after the service, and everything happened so fast and it’s not like we had rehearsed this, so off we went to stand there and shake people’s hands. Our father had told my sister that we could wait outside, but I didn’t know that was an option. We greeted about 100 people, about 10 of them I vaguely remember from my repressed childhood memories. 80 of the people were over 70 years old and gray-haired, and while they spoke my name, and I just smiled at them, I thought, Who the hell ARE you??
Going into this, I had intentions of being polite. I was going to be respectful and friendly because funerals aren’t really the time to be angry and slit-eyed and rehash old grudges. Too bad other people didn't come in with the same intentions. How naïve I was to think that by being open I could change perceptions. People, people that I didn’t even know or remember, thought it was in their Godly duty to take this opportunity to voice their opinions to my sister and me. There was even one of my dad’s cousins that I recognized who had been like an aunt and whom I had fond memories of, who now glared at me with disapproval and a jaw-clenched, puffy-cheeked frown (and of course, no greeting. What!? Do I owe you money or something?). We were told things like, “Let the past be the past,” and “You should have visited your grandfather more; he talked about you often, I expect to see you more at Grandma’s house from now on” and “He loved his sons very much; he loved his grandsons very much.” Period. Okay, then...
Three things boggle my mind:
1) Why are we the ones getting lectured and being told to forget the past? We are the products of divorce and all the adults involved (parents and grandparents) mishandled the situation, and continue to do so. We react to the lack of parenting and grandparenting involved. By that I mean lack of role models. If anyone should get a talking-to, it should be my father for his continuing indiscretions. My sister and I just look at each other and are confused when people approach us with this comment. Who’s not forgotten? We’ve gone on with OUR lives, get on with yours and OUT of OUR past!!! WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE?! And it’s none of your business anyway what goes on between me and my father! They turned a possibly innocuous re-meeting very ugly with unnecessary words. (Coincidentally, this is how my grandfather behaved.)
2) If someone hits you, doesn’t apologize, you’re supposed to forgive him. If they continue to hurt you, still don’t apologize, don’t think they’ve done anything wrong, you are still supposed to “forgive and forget.” Hmm. Do I have “walk on me” written across my forehead? Or am I just worth less than the one who’s hurting me? Do we tell this to victims of domestic violence? Do we teach our children this concept? If a child is getting beat up on the playground, do we say to him, “oh, just let the bully hit you, you need to forgive him for being mean.” Or do we pull the bully aside, talk to him, make him apologize and try to get him to see that what he was doing is wrong? The reason I bring this up is because my father and my grandfather have hurt me very much with their words and actions. Although I am an adult now, our relationships have been frozen in time; being the CHILD in all of these relationships, I don’t believe that it’s right to blame us for anything that ADULTS do or don’t do, especially divorce. My father and grandfather hurt me, so I made my feelings very clear, and left the environment. They did not apologize, or change to accommodate me in their lives, so I did not go back. How is this wrong? Just because they’re my elders I’m supposed to take the abuse? Every time I try to reconcile, let down my walls so we can start anew, one of the men manages to f*ck it up with the same words and actions, and I’m left hurt again. Why is this MY fault? Yet, I left the funeral yesterday with a heavy load of outsider judgments on my shoulders. There’s nothing like feeling misunderstood for 10+ years. I felt mentally and physically impaired and frustrated.
3) There are some people who don’t believe in divorce and take it to the extreme where the products of a failed marriage are somehow associated with it. So to some people, I guess my sister and I are bastard children who shouldn’t deserve to live, despite that for the first 14 years of my life I was an accepted individual human being who was allowed to play with their kids. Okay, then. Nice to have known you. I'll just go die quietly in the corner. (of course, the man who acted this way turns out to be a well-respected pastor)
So this is what’s REALLY going on: my sister and I stopped speaking to our father over 10 years ago. Why? Not because we “sided with our mother and she turned us against him” but rather because my father chose (and CONTINUES TO CHOOSE) very inappropriate relationships with my mother’s female cousins. These women have literally torn my mother’s family apart, as if the already shameful and unheard of divorce between our parents wasn’t enough. Their presence at the funeral was inappropriate and, ironically, therefore expected. One of the women approached us and tried to make small talk, telling me how pretty I’ve grown (and I wanted to say, “I wish I could say the same about you,” but didn’t) and asking if I still worked at the Getty (to which I responded with a curt “yes” and looked away, disinterested). And she knew my sister had a baby. How on earth would she, my mother’s cast-off first cousin, have known any of this information? I certainly know no one on my mother’s side said anything. It became quite clear that it was my father who is still keeping in contact with them. And obviously on a pretty regular basis, being that my sister had her baby no more than 5 weeks ago. She insisted on revealing that she knew personal information about us, and I wanted to scream in her face, “STEP OFF, BITCH!”
Although we had stopped speaking to our father 10+ years ago, we continued to visit our grandparents for a while after. By that time things were very ugly and my grandfather found out that we, two girls both under 20 years of age, were forsaking his beloved almost-50-year-old son who could do no wrong. So on two separate visits (with a 6-month falling-out period) our grandfather to our faces cursed our mother, saying that she squandered all the money he’d given us over the past decades, that she was a selfish woman, and the divorce was all her fault. We were so angry that we couldn’t even fight back with evidence of my father’s laziness as a husband responsible for maintaining a running household, immaturity as a guiding father figure, multiple infidelities brought into our home (my sister’s room, to be exact), and as a spineless son who was ordered to remarry to save face. In any case, stop using us as pawns in your twisted game! So we stopped visiting them as well, which was unfair to my grandmother (she enabled the behavior but we can’t really blame her for that).
After all the snippets of opinions we were hearing yesterday compounded with the fact that these women actually showed up at the funeral (and one bawled uncontrollably in my father’s arms like his mistress while my stepmom looked on, passively), we saw my father introduce them to old family friends – so my sister and I hightailed it out of there in contempt.
After doing so, I wondered if it was a bad decision. No doubt everyone noticed that we’d left early in a huff without saying goodbye, and thought, “There they go again, still acting out even at the funeral, those are [my mom’s name]’s daughters, how shameful, such poorly raised girls...” And while I can easily say, ‘well f*ck you all, you don’t know half the sh*t that’s going on!’ I also wonder if we just gave them more fuel to add to their already massive fire of misperceptions. What were we supposed to do? Acquiesce to the inappropriate behavior and witness it like we agree and are OK with it? I suppose none of it really matters; there was no changing their minds about us one way or another. We've been tagged for years already.
The offender gets away with it because he’s all smiles and act like nothing’s immoral about anything he does. He’s just an easy-going guy who’s friendly and charming. So when we react by putting on an ugly face and acting bitchy, we turn out to be the villains (aka [my mom’s name]’s daughters), and my father comes out looking like the poor, innocent victim of hot-tempered, ill-mannered, and sacrilegious children raised by the hellish ex-wife. (to which I say, hey, at least SOMEONE raised us...)
This morning, I turned on the TV and Joel Osteen was on. Osteen says that when God causes problems and commotions in our lives and closes doors, we shouldn’t be bitter and think, Oh, just another thing to happen to me... God closes doors whether or not we like it or are ready for it, changing the old and creating the new, and we shouldn’t keep trying to go back to how things used to be. We should look toward this new path and while we can think [fondly] of the old, now it’s time to create new memories and new traditions. Now I’m not an expert in theology by any means, and I admit I haven’t read the Bible all the way through, and I know Joel Osteen is a controversial preacher (or “motivational speaker”), but I like that his messages can be applied to my life and I can use positive ways to go forth. (Whether or not this is blasphemous is not for me to say; I make use of any tools I can get my hands on and try to be my best self.) So perhaps instead of laying in a fetal position in bed all day feeling like a sack of sh*t and wondering why I can’t have the warm and fuzzy relationship I had with my father in my younger years, I should keep this door closed and move forward without the man I thought I wanted to share my new life with. I’m even considering dis-inviting him to my wedding if he can’t comply to my now one-and-only rule: if I were to start sharing my life with him, he must immediately stop disclosing details of MY life and MY information with THEM. (And sadly, as easy and painless as that sounds, I don’t see him giving that up for me.) If that’s the case, I can stop asking “why” and “can’t he just” and “what if”. And especially stop hoping that my dad will start to take us seriously, really HEAR what my sister and I are saying, and choose us instead of his “friends” – perhaps this is a door that is definitely closed, and although I’m saddened by the prospect, it may be for the best for me and my future family.
Ah-Gong’s funeral was yesterday. I spent the day not thinking about it, Rick and I ran errands in the morning, and I took an hour and a half to get ready. Upon arriving at the funeral site with my sister and brother-in-law, I greeted my father and other relatives at the door of the chapel. I wasn’t nervous; rather, confident, because I was looking good and I guess had the intention of looking like the 27-year-old woman that I am to people I hadn’t seen in over 10 years. It was almost like a high school reunion where you show up looking like you’re accepting an award, and people look at you and marvel at how much you’ve changed since high school when you were a dumpy nerd with knobby knees. It didn’t work in my favor yesterday that I look very much like my mother.
The service was interesting. I’d somehow forgotten that, duh, the whole thing would be in Chinese, and surprisingly, I understood about 80% of it all. Go me. Although I wished I hadn’t understood that much. What was said wasn’t all that nice, a little self-indulgent on the ministers’ parts (of course, touting that this was God’s message and Ah-Gong was a saint), and very over-the-top preachery in a loud and dramatic way. I remembered why I never liked Chinese church, and especially why I stopped going to Chinese church in the first place. These people are pieces of work. I wondered if I was in a cult.
Grandma asked us to be in the receiving line after the service, and everything happened so fast and it’s not like we had rehearsed this, so off we went to stand there and shake people’s hands. Our father had told my sister that we could wait outside, but I didn’t know that was an option. We greeted about 100 people, about 10 of them I vaguely remember from my repressed childhood memories. 80 of the people were over 70 years old and gray-haired, and while they spoke my name, and I just smiled at them, I thought, Who the hell ARE you??
Going into this, I had intentions of being polite. I was going to be respectful and friendly because funerals aren’t really the time to be angry and slit-eyed and rehash old grudges. Too bad other people didn't come in with the same intentions. How naïve I was to think that by being open I could change perceptions. People, people that I didn’t even know or remember, thought it was in their Godly duty to take this opportunity to voice their opinions to my sister and me. There was even one of my dad’s cousins that I recognized who had been like an aunt and whom I had fond memories of, who now glared at me with disapproval and a jaw-clenched, puffy-cheeked frown (and of course, no greeting. What!? Do I owe you money or something?). We were told things like, “Let the past be the past,” and “You should have visited your grandfather more; he talked about you often, I expect to see you more at Grandma’s house from now on” and “He loved his sons very much; he loved his grandsons very much.” Period. Okay, then...
Three things boggle my mind:
1) Why are we the ones getting lectured and being told to forget the past? We are the products of divorce and all the adults involved (parents and grandparents) mishandled the situation, and continue to do so. We react to the lack of parenting and grandparenting involved. By that I mean lack of role models. If anyone should get a talking-to, it should be my father for his continuing indiscretions. My sister and I just look at each other and are confused when people approach us with this comment. Who’s not forgotten? We’ve gone on with OUR lives, get on with yours and OUT of OUR past!!! WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE?! And it’s none of your business anyway what goes on between me and my father! They turned a possibly innocuous re-meeting very ugly with unnecessary words. (Coincidentally, this is how my grandfather behaved.)
2) If someone hits you, doesn’t apologize, you’re supposed to forgive him. If they continue to hurt you, still don’t apologize, don’t think they’ve done anything wrong, you are still supposed to “forgive and forget.” Hmm. Do I have “walk on me” written across my forehead? Or am I just worth less than the one who’s hurting me? Do we tell this to victims of domestic violence? Do we teach our children this concept? If a child is getting beat up on the playground, do we say to him, “oh, just let the bully hit you, you need to forgive him for being mean.” Or do we pull the bully aside, talk to him, make him apologize and try to get him to see that what he was doing is wrong? The reason I bring this up is because my father and my grandfather have hurt me very much with their words and actions. Although I am an adult now, our relationships have been frozen in time; being the CHILD in all of these relationships, I don’t believe that it’s right to blame us for anything that ADULTS do or don’t do, especially divorce. My father and grandfather hurt me, so I made my feelings very clear, and left the environment. They did not apologize, or change to accommodate me in their lives, so I did not go back. How is this wrong? Just because they’re my elders I’m supposed to take the abuse? Every time I try to reconcile, let down my walls so we can start anew, one of the men manages to f*ck it up with the same words and actions, and I’m left hurt again. Why is this MY fault? Yet, I left the funeral yesterday with a heavy load of outsider judgments on my shoulders. There’s nothing like feeling misunderstood for 10+ years. I felt mentally and physically impaired and frustrated.
3) There are some people who don’t believe in divorce and take it to the extreme where the products of a failed marriage are somehow associated with it. So to some people, I guess my sister and I are bastard children who shouldn’t deserve to live, despite that for the first 14 years of my life I was an accepted individual human being who was allowed to play with their kids. Okay, then. Nice to have known you. I'll just go die quietly in the corner. (of course, the man who acted this way turns out to be a well-respected pastor)
So this is what’s REALLY going on: my sister and I stopped speaking to our father over 10 years ago. Why? Not because we “sided with our mother and she turned us against him” but rather because my father chose (and CONTINUES TO CHOOSE) very inappropriate relationships with my mother’s female cousins. These women have literally torn my mother’s family apart, as if the already shameful and unheard of divorce between our parents wasn’t enough. Their presence at the funeral was inappropriate and, ironically, therefore expected. One of the women approached us and tried to make small talk, telling me how pretty I’ve grown (and I wanted to say, “I wish I could say the same about you,” but didn’t) and asking if I still worked at the Getty (to which I responded with a curt “yes” and looked away, disinterested). And she knew my sister had a baby. How on earth would she, my mother’s cast-off first cousin, have known any of this information? I certainly know no one on my mother’s side said anything. It became quite clear that it was my father who is still keeping in contact with them. And obviously on a pretty regular basis, being that my sister had her baby no more than 5 weeks ago. She insisted on revealing that she knew personal information about us, and I wanted to scream in her face, “STEP OFF, BITCH!”
Although we had stopped speaking to our father 10+ years ago, we continued to visit our grandparents for a while after. By that time things were very ugly and my grandfather found out that we, two girls both under 20 years of age, were forsaking his beloved almost-50-year-old son who could do no wrong. So on two separate visits (with a 6-month falling-out period) our grandfather to our faces cursed our mother, saying that she squandered all the money he’d given us over the past decades, that she was a selfish woman, and the divorce was all her fault. We were so angry that we couldn’t even fight back with evidence of my father’s laziness as a husband responsible for maintaining a running household, immaturity as a guiding father figure, multiple infidelities brought into our home (my sister’s room, to be exact), and as a spineless son who was ordered to remarry to save face. In any case, stop using us as pawns in your twisted game! So we stopped visiting them as well, which was unfair to my grandmother (she enabled the behavior but we can’t really blame her for that).
After all the snippets of opinions we were hearing yesterday compounded with the fact that these women actually showed up at the funeral (and one bawled uncontrollably in my father’s arms like his mistress while my stepmom looked on, passively), we saw my father introduce them to old family friends – so my sister and I hightailed it out of there in contempt.
After doing so, I wondered if it was a bad decision. No doubt everyone noticed that we’d left early in a huff without saying goodbye, and thought, “There they go again, still acting out even at the funeral, those are [my mom’s name]’s daughters, how shameful, such poorly raised girls...” And while I can easily say, ‘well f*ck you all, you don’t know half the sh*t that’s going on!’ I also wonder if we just gave them more fuel to add to their already massive fire of misperceptions. What were we supposed to do? Acquiesce to the inappropriate behavior and witness it like we agree and are OK with it? I suppose none of it really matters; there was no changing their minds about us one way or another. We've been tagged for years already.
The offender gets away with it because he’s all smiles and act like nothing’s immoral about anything he does. He’s just an easy-going guy who’s friendly and charming. So when we react by putting on an ugly face and acting bitchy, we turn out to be the villains (aka [my mom’s name]’s daughters), and my father comes out looking like the poor, innocent victim of hot-tempered, ill-mannered, and sacrilegious children raised by the hellish ex-wife. (to which I say, hey, at least SOMEONE raised us...)
This morning, I turned on the TV and Joel Osteen was on. Osteen says that when God causes problems and commotions in our lives and closes doors, we shouldn’t be bitter and think, Oh, just another thing to happen to me... God closes doors whether or not we like it or are ready for it, changing the old and creating the new, and we shouldn’t keep trying to go back to how things used to be. We should look toward this new path and while we can think [fondly] of the old, now it’s time to create new memories and new traditions. Now I’m not an expert in theology by any means, and I admit I haven’t read the Bible all the way through, and I know Joel Osteen is a controversial preacher (or “motivational speaker”), but I like that his messages can be applied to my life and I can use positive ways to go forth. (Whether or not this is blasphemous is not for me to say; I make use of any tools I can get my hands on and try to be my best self.) So perhaps instead of laying in a fetal position in bed all day feeling like a sack of sh*t and wondering why I can’t have the warm and fuzzy relationship I had with my father in my younger years, I should keep this door closed and move forward without the man I thought I wanted to share my new life with. I’m even considering dis-inviting him to my wedding if he can’t comply to my now one-and-only rule: if I were to start sharing my life with him, he must immediately stop disclosing details of MY life and MY information with THEM. (And sadly, as easy and painless as that sounds, I don’t see him giving that up for me.) If that’s the case, I can stop asking “why” and “can’t he just” and “what if”. And especially stop hoping that my dad will start to take us seriously, really HEAR what my sister and I are saying, and choose us instead of his “friends” – perhaps this is a door that is definitely closed, and although I’m saddened by the prospect, it may be for the best for me and my future family.
Monday, April 28, 2008
Goodbye, Ah-Gong
It's been a rough re-entry from our weekend mini-vacation from San Diego. We had a wonderful time exploring the city and having good meals. I ate a whole dungeness crab by myself for lunch (well, Rick helped with 3 legs or so).
First off, let me just say that last night, we got news that my paternal grandfather had passed away on Saturday. He had been quite ill. About a year ago, he had three surgeries in two weeks, which included having a pacemaker put in. After many months in the hospital, he was moved to a nursing home. A few months after that, he was moved back home permanently with a live-in nurse to help out. I visited him at Christmas time and he seemed to be much better than the previous visits, albeit thinner and got tired quicker.
The news came as a bit of a shock, even though he had been very ill. Although, frankly (and with guilt), I had not thought of him for many months. And perhaps that is why the following story is told with such uncertainty.
On Saturday afternoon, Rick and I took a walk along the beach and visited the pier on Shelter Island. There was a small bait and tackle office as well as an "education" room where shells and marine life were displayed. There were a few cases of dried butterflies and insects; they were mostly fantastically colored species that simultaneously caused you to cringe from the gross factor as well as enticed you to come closer for a better look. It was fascinating and horrifying. We walked back to the hotel, and while crossing the parking lot, something dark caught my eye, and I cast my eyes downward. I saw this giant, black, beetle-roach-looking-thing monching on some crap on the ground. "Ewww!!" I cried. And stifled the reflex to stomp on it. Live, and let live, right?
Back in the room, just minutes later, I pulled the bedspread down off the bed to get ready for a nap. I looked over at Rick, who had stopped what he was doing to point at the side of the bed, and said, "LOOK..."! I walked over, looked, and screamed like a bloody monster. Sitting there quietly on the inner part of the bedspread was the same, giant beetle-roach-looking thing that we had just seen outside. It was very big, very black, and very shiny. I panicked and ran around in circles before running to the sink area and getting the hotel's ice bucket. On my way, I shouted over my shoulder to Rick, "Call downstairs!"
Now, up until then, the hotel staff had been more than the usual nice, at least for us. They had greeted us promptly at the front desk, and housekeeping had directed us to the right wing as soon as they saw us looking around the hallway for our room. When Rick called the front desk to alert them to our situation, the man there had said, "What would you like us to do?" and because we've never had to deal with a bug infestation ever in our hotel rooms, Rick didn't know what to say. Umm, come get it?! The man asked if we'd like our sheets changed and we said yes.
We caught the beetle without much incident although when it fell off the covers, I screamed again before Rick somehow managed to corral it into the ice bucket. The room phone rang and it was the front desk man, asking if we'd caught or killed the bug, and that his manager would like to see it, so if we would please hand it to the staff that would be changing our sheets. I think this guy was new or just not particularly experienced as the other staff employees we'd dealt with.
Our sheets were changed by the on-call housekeeping staff. They were friendly, yet because they were simply the ones on-call and not the regular 12pm - 4pm crew that changes the sheets daily, they didn't seem to know what to do. But also because we were just standing there, watching them. Well anyways, I decided that instead of giving our evidence to them that we would take the critter ourselves to the front desk.
As we walked down the stairs with Rick clutching the ice bucket tightly in his hands, I saw that the manager was at the front desk. I somehow easily identified him as the manager because of the tell-tale glasses, moustache, and business clothing instead of the other staff's uniforms. We walked up to the counter, and Rick joked, "It's a fine specimen." Rick and I weren't angry or really taking this whole thing seriously, we were just shocked and creeped out, but we didn't make a scene or throw a fit. We just wanted to let them know and have the situation handled, and we didn't have any demands or motivation to make other guests worry. The manager, on the other hand, was quite inhumorous, which of course, was as he should be. He took the ice bucket, peered in, and said, "OH MY GOD." And apologized profusely and said that his housekeeping staff is usually very thorough. He looked up our room info and comp-ed our night. We thanked him and went back to our room, where we sat quietly and alert for the rest of the evening until dinner time.
The following morning, Sunday, after a wonderful complimentary breakfast buffet downstairs, we went back to our room to pack up to check-out by noon. It was already at least 80 degrees and our room was warming up from the sun streaming through the sliding doors off the balcony. We packed while we watched TV. At 10:30am, while we were both sitting on the bed with stuff laid out but eyes glued to the tv, we both saw something move and together whipped our eyes over to the movement. This time, along the carpet near the sliding door, yet another beetle was taking a stroll across the sunlight.
Rick and I looked at each other and said, "You've got to be kidding me." This time, without any screaming or any shock, I grabbed a small glass cup and Rick scooped it up easily. We sighed and just looked at each other. Should we call downstairs again? Should we let it go? We decided that we might as well take it down and tell them that it had happened again.
The Sunday morning front desk staff consisted of two women who shrieked when they saw the contents of our tissue-covered glass cup. They covered their mouths and opened their eyes wide, and one of them said, "Oh my gosh, I can't look at it, it's so disgusting," and took the cup to the back. She also mentioned that being a resident of San Diego who lives just a few blocks away, she's never seen any bug like this before. When Rick mentioned that this was our second bug, they said, "In the same room? We heard about the one yesterday." Which actually really impressed me, because that just shows how in-tune the management is with their staff. They looked up our room and said that the night manager had indeed comp-ed our room for last night, and we told them we would be checking out in an hour. We left them with good humor, so good and understanding that I started to wonder if they'd think we planted the beetle ourselves just to get a free night.
I should probably describe this beetle to give you a better picture of what we were dealing with. I didn't take any pictures, unfortunately, so I'm going on what I remember of this bug. I spent the morning looking in beetle databases to figure out what the heck we saw. I think all three were the same species, although I can't say for sure.
I narrowed it down to two types, but don't know the exact species. The Carabidae Calasoma genus of Ground Beetles or the Eliode Teenebrionida Darkling Beetle. Here are pictures of each (and yes, it's enough to make you vomit, unless you're totally into insects).
Our beetle was about 1.25 inches in length. Yep, one fat sucker. And when you see this big black thing on super white bed sheets, it really elicits screams of terror.
So last night, when I got the news about the passing of my grandfather, I began to think. After 10 minutes of the usual thoughts and emotions when you hear about a death, a distant memory popped into my head. Years ago, when my mother lost a long-time friend to cancer, before she'd gotten the news of his death, she'd been "harrassed" by a fly. It was in her home, in her car, at her parents' house. I'll have to get the details from her about the fly, but I distinctly remember her telling us that she believed the fly was her friend, coming by to tell her goodbye. And after the fly finally went away, she heard that her friend had died.
I don't know whether or not this beetle was my grandfather coming by to say goodbye. Or if he wanted something of me, or wanted to tell me something, or if he was approving or disapproving of anything. I mean, do spirits come to you in disgusting insect forms? Does it mean anything if the visitor is a cute ladybug, a buzzing wasp, or a beetle?
Analyzing the facts, I do choose to believe that the beetle was my grandfather. The situation is just too bizarre to be thought out rationally. We tore that room apart, looking for holes and crevices that perhaps the beetle had come out from. Nothing. The fact that no one else in the hotel complained about a beetle sighting in their room. The fact that no staff member had ever seen this type of insect in their area before. The fact that our room was on the second floor, away from any shrubs or gardens, and that if this beetle was a Ground Beetle that has no wings and is nocturnal, that we shouldn't have seen it on the second floor walking about and active during the daytime. The fact that we had seen the beetle three times. Possibly even in the cases on the pier, too, but I didn't pay that much attention to the details. Common bugs all look the same if you're not a bug-ologist or even remotely interested in these creatures.
So today, I'm still wondering what it is I'm supposed to do. I don't know if the beetle species itself is important. I don't know if it was just a bug big enough for us to see and not smoosh. I don't know how I'm supposed to interpret any of this information. I don't know if the appearance of the beetle is a good sign or a bad sign. But I do know that I want to say goodbye to my grandfather, whom I call Ah-Gong. And if he can forgive me for my indiscretions, I would be very humble. I apologize for not visiting more often during his older years, and have no excuses. Goodbye, Ah-Gong.
First off, let me just say that last night, we got news that my paternal grandfather had passed away on Saturday. He had been quite ill. About a year ago, he had three surgeries in two weeks, which included having a pacemaker put in. After many months in the hospital, he was moved to a nursing home. A few months after that, he was moved back home permanently with a live-in nurse to help out. I visited him at Christmas time and he seemed to be much better than the previous visits, albeit thinner and got tired quicker.
The news came as a bit of a shock, even though he had been very ill. Although, frankly (and with guilt), I had not thought of him for many months. And perhaps that is why the following story is told with such uncertainty.
On Saturday afternoon, Rick and I took a walk along the beach and visited the pier on Shelter Island. There was a small bait and tackle office as well as an "education" room where shells and marine life were displayed. There were a few cases of dried butterflies and insects; they were mostly fantastically colored species that simultaneously caused you to cringe from the gross factor as well as enticed you to come closer for a better look. It was fascinating and horrifying. We walked back to the hotel, and while crossing the parking lot, something dark caught my eye, and I cast my eyes downward. I saw this giant, black, beetle-roach-looking-thing monching on some crap on the ground. "Ewww!!" I cried. And stifled the reflex to stomp on it. Live, and let live, right?
Back in the room, just minutes later, I pulled the bedspread down off the bed to get ready for a nap. I looked over at Rick, who had stopped what he was doing to point at the side of the bed, and said, "LOOK..."! I walked over, looked, and screamed like a bloody monster. Sitting there quietly on the inner part of the bedspread was the same, giant beetle-roach-looking thing that we had just seen outside. It was very big, very black, and very shiny. I panicked and ran around in circles before running to the sink area and getting the hotel's ice bucket. On my way, I shouted over my shoulder to Rick, "Call downstairs!"
Now, up until then, the hotel staff had been more than the usual nice, at least for us. They had greeted us promptly at the front desk, and housekeeping had directed us to the right wing as soon as they saw us looking around the hallway for our room. When Rick called the front desk to alert them to our situation, the man there had said, "What would you like us to do?" and because we've never had to deal with a bug infestation ever in our hotel rooms, Rick didn't know what to say. Umm, come get it?! The man asked if we'd like our sheets changed and we said yes.
We caught the beetle without much incident although when it fell off the covers, I screamed again before Rick somehow managed to corral it into the ice bucket. The room phone rang and it was the front desk man, asking if we'd caught or killed the bug, and that his manager would like to see it, so if we would please hand it to the staff that would be changing our sheets. I think this guy was new or just not particularly experienced as the other staff employees we'd dealt with.
Our sheets were changed by the on-call housekeeping staff. They were friendly, yet because they were simply the ones on-call and not the regular 12pm - 4pm crew that changes the sheets daily, they didn't seem to know what to do. But also because we were just standing there, watching them. Well anyways, I decided that instead of giving our evidence to them that we would take the critter ourselves to the front desk.
As we walked down the stairs with Rick clutching the ice bucket tightly in his hands, I saw that the manager was at the front desk. I somehow easily identified him as the manager because of the tell-tale glasses, moustache, and business clothing instead of the other staff's uniforms. We walked up to the counter, and Rick joked, "It's a fine specimen." Rick and I weren't angry or really taking this whole thing seriously, we were just shocked and creeped out, but we didn't make a scene or throw a fit. We just wanted to let them know and have the situation handled, and we didn't have any demands or motivation to make other guests worry. The manager, on the other hand, was quite inhumorous, which of course, was as he should be. He took the ice bucket, peered in, and said, "OH MY GOD." And apologized profusely and said that his housekeeping staff is usually very thorough. He looked up our room info and comp-ed our night. We thanked him and went back to our room, where we sat quietly and alert for the rest of the evening until dinner time.
The following morning, Sunday, after a wonderful complimentary breakfast buffet downstairs, we went back to our room to pack up to check-out by noon. It was already at least 80 degrees and our room was warming up from the sun streaming through the sliding doors off the balcony. We packed while we watched TV. At 10:30am, while we were both sitting on the bed with stuff laid out but eyes glued to the tv, we both saw something move and together whipped our eyes over to the movement. This time, along the carpet near the sliding door, yet another beetle was taking a stroll across the sunlight.
Rick and I looked at each other and said, "You've got to be kidding me." This time, without any screaming or any shock, I grabbed a small glass cup and Rick scooped it up easily. We sighed and just looked at each other. Should we call downstairs again? Should we let it go? We decided that we might as well take it down and tell them that it had happened again.
The Sunday morning front desk staff consisted of two women who shrieked when they saw the contents of our tissue-covered glass cup. They covered their mouths and opened their eyes wide, and one of them said, "Oh my gosh, I can't look at it, it's so disgusting," and took the cup to the back. She also mentioned that being a resident of San Diego who lives just a few blocks away, she's never seen any bug like this before. When Rick mentioned that this was our second bug, they said, "In the same room? We heard about the one yesterday." Which actually really impressed me, because that just shows how in-tune the management is with their staff. They looked up our room and said that the night manager had indeed comp-ed our room for last night, and we told them we would be checking out in an hour. We left them with good humor, so good and understanding that I started to wonder if they'd think we planted the beetle ourselves just to get a free night.
I should probably describe this beetle to give you a better picture of what we were dealing with. I didn't take any pictures, unfortunately, so I'm going on what I remember of this bug. I spent the morning looking in beetle databases to figure out what the heck we saw. I think all three were the same species, although I can't say for sure.
I narrowed it down to two types, but don't know the exact species. The Carabidae Calasoma genus of Ground Beetles or the Eliode Teenebrionida Darkling Beetle. Here are pictures of each (and yes, it's enough to make you vomit, unless you're totally into insects).
Our beetle was about 1.25 inches in length. Yep, one fat sucker. And when you see this big black thing on super white bed sheets, it really elicits screams of terror.
So last night, when I got the news about the passing of my grandfather, I began to think. After 10 minutes of the usual thoughts and emotions when you hear about a death, a distant memory popped into my head. Years ago, when my mother lost a long-time friend to cancer, before she'd gotten the news of his death, she'd been "harrassed" by a fly. It was in her home, in her car, at her parents' house. I'll have to get the details from her about the fly, but I distinctly remember her telling us that she believed the fly was her friend, coming by to tell her goodbye. And after the fly finally went away, she heard that her friend had died.
I don't know whether or not this beetle was my grandfather coming by to say goodbye. Or if he wanted something of me, or wanted to tell me something, or if he was approving or disapproving of anything. I mean, do spirits come to you in disgusting insect forms? Does it mean anything if the visitor is a cute ladybug, a buzzing wasp, or a beetle?
Analyzing the facts, I do choose to believe that the beetle was my grandfather. The situation is just too bizarre to be thought out rationally. We tore that room apart, looking for holes and crevices that perhaps the beetle had come out from. Nothing. The fact that no one else in the hotel complained about a beetle sighting in their room. The fact that no staff member had ever seen this type of insect in their area before. The fact that our room was on the second floor, away from any shrubs or gardens, and that if this beetle was a Ground Beetle that has no wings and is nocturnal, that we shouldn't have seen it on the second floor walking about and active during the daytime. The fact that we had seen the beetle three times. Possibly even in the cases on the pier, too, but I didn't pay that much attention to the details. Common bugs all look the same if you're not a bug-ologist or even remotely interested in these creatures.
So today, I'm still wondering what it is I'm supposed to do. I don't know if the beetle species itself is important. I don't know if it was just a bug big enough for us to see and not smoosh. I don't know how I'm supposed to interpret any of this information. I don't know if the appearance of the beetle is a good sign or a bad sign. But I do know that I want to say goodbye to my grandfather, whom I call Ah-Gong. And if he can forgive me for my indiscretions, I would be very humble. I apologize for not visiting more often during his older years, and have no excuses. Goodbye, Ah-Gong.
Monday, April 21, 2008
An entry from the Dictionary of Bella Grace
Minnie Bihon - /MIN-nee BEE-hohn/. n. Origins: Philippines and US. Evolution of and pun on Filipino noodle dish, Miki Bihon, and Disney character used to describe a particularly cute baby named Isabella. See fig. 1. Also Monkey Bihon, Monster Bihon, Hungry Bihon, Naughty Bihon. Created by Momma Hsiny, authored and documented by Auntie Mingy.
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