The Wedding Dress--A Review

If you tend to shy away from book reviews, feel free to shy away now.

I tend to love them... so they often end up here--especially since I'm reading like a MANIAC right now. So here goes...

Courtesy of Booksneeze

This book is one of the reasons I love reading. First, I love costuming as much as reading, and I spent a year sewing alterations in a bridal shop, so I absolutely love fancy dresses--especially wedding dresses. But that's not the reason I love this book. It was a review copy from the publisher, so I didn't have to pay for it. Also a bonus, but not at all the reason I loved the book, for I am given full permission to review it honestly. And I am utterly honest.

No, nothing is pressuring me to like this book, but it is still likely one of the best-written books I've read this year (or last, for that matter). Great characters for me to sympathize with, lovely stories, good, solid writing, drama and suspense--add to that a bit of magic, a bit of weddingishness, and the mixed up sort of love story where, at several different moments over the last 100 years, couples are trying to figure out what is love and what isn't. Given the pressure of marriage--but, even more so, the pressure place on young people to BE married, to marry the RIGHT person, and often to marry a person for other reasons than love--this book is a lovely intertwining of people struggling to make the right choice, to act for the right reasons, not out of duty or greed or merely good intentions. It's a sort of fictional instruction book about following your heart, your gut, instead of letting distractions push you into a choice you will regret all the more later.

I fell into this book in a way I haven't fallen much lately. It reminded me of the reasons I married, the years of our marriage, and the serious step I took once, all that time ago. And it reminded me of my own wedding dress, which I designed and made myself, from crinoline to lace edging. A lovely book. A little religious, but mainstream in its focus. I would definitely read more by this author, whether the books figured a wedding dress or not!

What about the rest of you? Any good reads? Anything you'd recommend? Anyone going to see the midnight showing of THE HUNGER GAMES?

Verse Thursday--"The Eve of St. Agnes"

St. Agnes' Eve - Ah, bitter chill it was!

Tomorrow is the fateful day--St. Agnes' Eve--the day when young women, observing certain rights, can gain a glimpse of their future husband. John Keats, one of my favorite poets EVER, immortalized this day for me by writing one of the most beautiful poems in the English language using this tradition. His tale of star-crossed lovers still gets to me twenty-five years after I first read it.

These let us wish away,
And turn, sole-thoughted, to one Lady there,
Whose heart had brooded, all that wintry day,
On love, and wing'd St. Agnes' saintly care,
As she had heard old dames full many times declare.

They told her how, upon St. Agnes' Eve,
Young virgins might have visions of delight,
And soft adorings from their loves receive
Upon the honey'd middle of the night,
If ceremonies due they did aright;
As, supperless to bed they must retire,
And couch supine their beauties, lily white;
Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require
Of Heaven with upward eyes for all that they desire.

Is it myth? I can't say for certain, but I do know that my first date with the hubby was on January 19, many, many years ago.

It was not a good date. He almost didn't ask me out again, actually, and I thought he was pretty quiet. But the next evening, with thoughts of Keats' poem in my head, I opened my blinds so that the full moon could pour its light into my room, I ate without speaking to anyone (not hard in a family of seven kids), went to bed early, and dreamed of my future husband. Yup, I was working at a store counter in my dream, and there he was, tall dark and handsome (as he still is after 22 years), with the golden sunlight casting him in shadow there in front of me.

A simple dream--just us talking softly over the counter--but it was definitely him. The next morning, on January 21, St. Agnes' Day, I remember pondering over the little dream, wondering why I dreamed of him, since the date had not been all that spectacular. Madeline, the girl in the poem, is shocked for a different reason when she awakes, for she was dreaming of her love Porphyro, but when she sees him at her bedside, he looks so different:

"Ah, Porphyro!" said she, "but even now
Thy voice was at sweet tremble in mine ear,
Made tuneable with every sweetest vow;
And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear:
How chang'd thou art! how pallid, chill, and drear!
Give me that voice again, my Porphyro,
Those looks immortal, those complainings dear!
Oh leave me not in this eternal woe,
For if thy diest, my Love, I know not where to go."

And Porphyro goes to her, "like a throbbing star." No, really. And I wish I knew how Keats had written the poem originally, since editors made him clean it up a bit for readers. Even in its current form it's pretty, um, appealing.

Beyond a mortal man impassion'd far
At these voluptuous accents, he arose
Ethereal, flush'd, and like a throbbing star
Seen mid the sapphire heaven's deep repose;
Into her dream he melted, as the rose
Blendeth its odour with the violet,--


The hubby and I found more poetry, too. We had another date a week later--January 26. This time,  wrapped in a blanket outside to watch clouds drift over the waning moon, we both found our world tilted in beautiful new ways. As I reread Keats' poem, I cannot help but see the young versions of us here. My parents didn't approve of us, but we've still made it through all these years, and my feelings are even deeper than they used to be. We were the Romeo and Juliet who made it, who found courage and devotion could make more drastic measures unnecessary.

Like Porphyro and Madeline, we just moved on together, making a life for each other:

And they are gone: aye, ages long ago
These lovers fled away into the storm.

Keats wrote no poem about the world they created together somewhere else. I don't need it, though. The hubby and I have made that world all on our own.

(Excerpts courtesy of Poetry Online)

Living Now

The most wonderful thing has happened. Mom is dating again. 

She's been widowed for more than three years, and while she's managed to keep extremely busy all this while, and has grown even more confident and beautiful (can you tell I like her?), she's also spent much of the last few years alone. 

It isn't that I feel she needs a man in her life to be complete. Please do not reply with hate mail that women can get along perfectly well without a guy (especially a creep). No, she didn't join an Internet dating thing so that she could settle down really quickly and find somebody whose socks needed washing, who couldn't cook properly for himself, or who had just lost his wife. 

She joined for the best of reasons: to live. She is a very healthy, happy woman with lively blue eyes and a great personality. She has tons of interests and tons of hobbies, and she has amassed a tremendous number of skills over the years. But she has been, over the past few months, spending her days reading, resting, having her morning coffee, and pretty much just doing ordinary stuff all by herself. She hasn't been unhappy, she's just been sort of existing.

Remember, a few blog entries ago, when I talked about how much I loved change? I realized that much of the reason I read is that I want to experience something new. Sometimes the same old stuff seems... well... the same. The same can be happy, sort of, but it can also get pretty dull.

Mom just came to visit, and for the first time in years, I have seen her truly excited. She is flirting online with men, exchanging "winks" back and forth, reading through listings, going on coffee dates. Just today she left for home, her cheeks all flushed from excitement and nervousness because her favorite e-mail pal had sent his phone number and asked her to call him. 

Do I want to date? Nope. I'm very happily wedded to the ol' hubby here, and I think I'll stick with him for a long while. But I love to see Mom living. Living is the reason I won't be teaching online classes for an old employer--if I do, I know that for around 12 weeks my life will be on hold. I can't put my life on hold anymore. When should I live? Right now. 

When should you live? Right now. 

Don't tell me you have a cold. If living means snuggling into a comforter with a box of tissues and sleeping, then do it. If it means working on that novel (in my case), then work on it. If it means playing with your kids, petting your cat, jumping around to Irish dance music, or singing at the top of your lungs, then do that.

I know you can. Surely you have a few minutes. Live now.