Bleary Brides

It seems to be inevitable for brides to cry on their wedding day. I didn’t understand at first. I attributed their breakdown to the culmination of all the stress that led up to the day. Plus the sheer euphoria, the eventual backlash of all the emotional spices that get thrown into the cauldron of a wedding soup. Everything that has a beginning must surely have and end, I reasoned. Brides cry because after smiling the whole day, there’s nothing else to do. With that I concluded it would be silly to cry on my own wedding day.

That morning I woke up gloriously happy. If it were possible I would have skipped all the way to the moon, done a little dance as I orbited it and skipped right back. It felt almost surreal. At one point it was as if some other ‘self’ had inhabited my skin and I was watching in from the outside.

I was still doing great until I was about leaving with my new family when my sister in law said, ‘Won’t you give your mum one last hug.’ That did it for me! Before you could say, ‘wedding cake!’ tears were streaming down my face. I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I can say I honestly did not know where that came from. That statement hit me and it hit me hard.

It dawned on me I was leaving home for good to be someone’s wife. No longer would my my mother be there to comfort me; I would have to be the one comforting others. I would have to be strong, have faith, resilient... I would have to be a wife, a mother and a sister.

No, it was not a sad farewell but one that would take me down a never trodden path. What lay at the end of the tunnel were not concretes I could hear, taste, smell, feel or see. But hopes and hopefully sweet memories. I sobbed in the car on the way home. While consoling me he joked that his responsibilities as a husband had started. If it was possible to roll my bleary eyes then I would have. But my emotions were like sore muscles..

By the way, I heard most men are angered by a weeping wife. They think it puts a damp on the occassion. My only response is; wait till your daughter is getting married. Then perhaps, maybe, you'll have an inkling as to why a woman weeps.