…Just the way it was.

 

I’ve been married for three months…! Jesus, that went by fast!

So, I posted a photo re-cap, but I never did write about the dress debacle I had.

Now, for all of my friends their weddings seemed to go by flawlessly. Truth is, in the end you’re the only one who notices all the stupid shit that happens, that would make you crazy, but in the end it doesn’t matter, because, you are after all, getting married.

For me, yes, things went wrong, but all of the downs ended up working in my favour, somehow.

So, I woke up to rain. The most important part of the day for me, was the first look, to be had outside, under our tree at the Supreme Court.

Rain kind of threw a wrench in those plans. 

But, lucky for me, that moment meant more to me, than the rest, so a little rain wasn’t getting me down.

By the time I was dolled up and in my dress, It was only drizzling slightly, so when my photographer asked if I was game to shoot outside, I had no hesitation about it at all.

When we got to the SC, my photographer said he much better liked the view from the stone ledge, and framed the shots,  on the far side of the ledge.

The spot was marked by a small pile of fallen, orange leaves. That spot, was our spot. 

But Isha, I thought your spot was under the tree?

Under the tree was where we got engaged, because our spot on the ledge was too crowded.

So I held an umbrella over us, as Sam open his gift from me. The card of which, just happened to feature a cute cartoon couple standing under an umbrella, which read,

"True love is willing to share the rain, while waiting for the sun to shine".

 
How appropriate. But, I loved this… because this photo can’t be planned or manipulated. You need to have those components. The perfect card, the perfect weather, the perfect photographer that sees it, and captures it.

Isha, I thought you were going to talk about your dress?

Yes, yes, I’m getting there. 

My Wedding Planner, set us up with so much extra time, we were way ahead of schedule. I even chilled in the managers office, while my guests arrived… late.

For once, I was the early bride, with the guests who started showing up after the ceremony start time.

It worked out fine. The ceremony was amazing. It’s almost like a blur to look back on. Months, of writing, and re-writing that script, and it was done and over in a few flashes of a camera.

Things were on track and going well. That’s when it screeched to a halt.

Sort of.

We had zipped over to the NAC for bridal portraits with our photographers, and upon our return to the restaurant, Sam informed me my dress was ripped.


Yes, ladies. The seams of my expensive, custom made, wedding dress were coming apart. 

Being a fitted dress, I thought maybe, it ripped because it’s tight? But, the truth is, on the day of, my dress was slightly big. 

I took a deep breath, and continued on. What could I do now? Nothing. I married my best friend, and I’ll be damned if a dress was going to ruin it.

Dinner, speeches and jokes (that was our ‘kissing game’) went amazingly. The venue was gorgeous, and the food was incredible. Wine was flowing and people were having a great time. Thats when I noticed a second seam coming undone, in the front this time, in an area where my dress wasn’t be pulled or stretched, so I knew this wasn’t a rip from any sort of pressure.

The shop where I bought my dress is well known in Ottawa. Ottawa being their home base. They make their gowns out of Italian Silk, and french lace. Every dress is custom made to fit your body like a glove. 

From the first moment I met the designer and his consultant, they extended such great service, and really made you feel as if they understood all of the accompanying feelings and emotions that are invested and attached to a wedding dress. 

It wasn’t until after that I would find out, the image is just that, an image. They care no more for your dreams of having the perfect dress than they do about the money you give them.

I spent a lot more than most modern brides spend on their wedding dress. When my dress was all said and done, it was just over $4000.00.

Now to spend that kind of money on a garment that you wear once, and only for so many hours in itself is crazy. But wouldn’t you assume that it would at least last that one wear?

I thought so anyways. Call me naive, but it was my first (an only) time getting married.

So I pulled out my phone and e-mailed the designer. I clearly stated that I was concerned that the dress was deteriorating and wouldn’t last the night, and I had made the decision to send the groomsmen to get me a back up outfit, that by chance i had. I asked him, if I could bring the dress in and have them look at it before returning to Alberta.

He wasn’t sympathetic at all. He said he would open the shop, and I could bring it by around 1pm the following day.

So I did just that. After the first dance, I bolted to the washroom and changed from my wedding dress into my Lengha.

In 2008, I went to India with my parents. While I was there, and once it became clear that I was with Sam, my aunts showered me with Indian wedding attire. Jewellery and clothes.

Sam and I decided that we weren’t going to have an Indian wedding, nor a church wedding. We wrote our ceremony and rented a trendy downtown restaurant.

When I finally found my dress, I decided if I was spending the money on it, it would be the only dress I would be wearing that day. So we got Indian Bridal dolled up for our Engagement pictures.

My mom really wanted me to wear the lengha. She asked and asked, but since we had already used it for engagement pictures, and I spent so much on my wedding dress, I told her that I wanted to wear just the one dress.

Ladies, always, have a back up.

When Sam was flying back to Ottawa for the Wedding, at the last minute he asked, is there anything else I should bring?

I caved. I said "Bring the wedding lengha, please". It’s heavy, and takes up enough room in the suitcase. 

He said "Are you actually going to wear it?".

I could tell he was annoyed. I told him about my mom, and plead my case.

When we unpacked in Ottawa. There it was. He brought it.
<img alt="Engagement Photo – Blair Gable Photography" width="500" height="333" src="http://i765.photobucket.com/albums/xx294/ishafortin/Isha-Sam8909_zps23d81931.jpg&#8221; />

I still wasn’t planning on wearing it. I thought maybe I would wake up on my wedding day and have a change of heart about wearing it after dinner for the reception. 

The night before, while we hosted our rehearsal dinner at the Condo, the shop delivered my dress to my hotel suite.

When I got back to the hotel that night, I opened the closet doors that housed my wedding dress.

I sat on the floor, looking up at it. All of those feelings, and emotions I have attached to that dress became very evident at that moment.

I sat there thinking… Tomorrow I’m getting married. 

I thought back through my life, all the crazy turns that brought me to this moment. 

The perfect man, my perfect dress. Everything had worked out for us, as hard as it was to get there.

I think every bride remembers that moment, that you actually realize, you’re getting married.

Anyways, back to the dress issue at hand.

I freaked out a little bit at this point. I was in the washroom, and Carita and my Wedding planner were checking out the dress.

It’s not like me to buy something that extravagant, and the dreadful feeling of how not worth it, it actually was was eating away at me.

After changing into my lengha, the first person I saw was my mother.

The way her face lit up, was worth the unfortunate events that had transpired with my dress. 

So since I wasn’t worried about my dress falling apart anymore, I was able to cut loose and dance the night away with my friends… aside from the toe issue that it, but I will touch on that.

So I bring him my dress. I am kind of expecting some sort of "I’m so sorry about this". That’s all I was looking for. I paid a great deal of money, so a quality garment, made and designed by this man.

I tell him that I’m sorry for inconveniencing him, because he’s usually closed on Sundays. I also tell him that I really appreciate that he’s going to the trouble to look at it.

He still to this day, hasn’t apologized for my inconvenience, or taken even small consideration that he might, be responsible. That maybe he did, just this once make a mistake.

I wasn’t upset about the dress, because yes it all worked out for me. But I was upset at how he handled it.

He said… and yes I quote;

"This has never happened to me before. Honestly it never has. I’ll take a look at it, and let you know what I can do".

I graciously thanked him for his trouble, and left. My heart felt heavy.

I wrote an email after I left feeling stung by indifference. I expressed to him how hurt I was on my wedding day when my dress started to fall apart.

He responded by accusing me of wanting monetary compensation, and listing as many other ways my wedding could have been ruined, that he could come up with.

I responded by telling him, that no, I don’t want money. Money isn’t going to change what happened. I told him all of the good things about my experience with them, and that when you’re selling wedding dresses, it’s not just a dress to the bride walking down the aisle in it.

He told me that Christina (the consultant) had given me her number, I should have called her. He also said no where in my email did I say I was concerned enough to change out of the dress. To which I responded, that exactly was what my initial email said.

I also told him, that yes I had Christina’s cell, but I was under the impression that it was for her to deliver the dress, and never once had either of them verbalized to me that if this type of situation occurred to call her, and have her come fix the dress. This option was never presented.

It was Saturday night, if I had known I would have called her certainly, but since I was unaware, I didn’t want to bother her on her personal time (made sense to me) 

The consultant called me, and said "This situation is too hard for David, after all it is his design, his work.

So Christina slung mud at me. She called the seams coming undone "an act of God". Really?

She then accused me of gaining an tremendous amount of weight in the time that I had my last two fittings on account of my dislocated toes.

So, I had my initial fitting in August, and the dress was way too big. Then in Mid October, I had my second fitting, and the dress was still much too big, and it would he 2 more weeks, and one dislocated toe before what should’ve been my last fitting.

After my second fitting, The dress was too big, and it wasn’t the fitted mermaid I had bought. So I emailed her and again apologized, but after thinking about it, it wasn’t fitted the same as the sample, so it was making me look wide. She agreed, I asked if they needed me to come in to measure my thighs/ waist to get the fit right before they took it in. She said, no it’s fine, we can make an accurate guess based on the measurements they took.

I was skeptical. For the first time since I met them, and began my dress journey I was weary that it wouldn’t fit again.

And, lo and behold. It was too tight in my hips. So Christina asked me to come in the next evening after they let it out again. This is three days before the wedding.

So I come in 2 days before, and it fits. It’s not snug. It’s has a lot of give, and I don’t feel suffocated. Of course, you take it day by day, and on my wedding day, it was just a tiny bit too big.

So this is the instance in which she accused me of gaining weight. I called her out on it, of course,  because it’s one thing not to accept any responsibility, but to bring my weight into it was inappropriate.

Of course, Christina knows she’s not going to win a war of words with me, and asks me what I want. I said I want your boutique to take some responsibility. I tell her she’s lucky it’s me, and I have an understanding of the difficulties of working with brides, because if it was some spoiled trust fund princess, they might have a media issue on their hands.

I tell her that, the dress wasn’t worth the money I spent on it, and I learned that the hard way. She kept saying "We just want you to be happy". 

To which I said, you win some, and you lose some, and unfortunately we both lost in this case. I won’t trash you all over Social Media, but you can be sure I will never recommend McCaffrey Haute Couture to any of my friends, nor any of the brides I do work for. You will never get a recommendation from me. Which isn’t a big deal.

I also told her that if David wants to continue in this business, in a world where brides are looking less about lavish couture gowns, and the wedding industry is becoming more personalized, he needs to understand that this is one of the biggest purchases women make, and even though to him we’re just dollar signs and not repeat business, he has to learn how to deal with people when these types of feelings are attached.

Ithink that got to her. She said David was ‘willing to’ fix my dress, and have it cleaned/preserved and they would pay to have it shipped to me out here.

I haven’t thought about it much since. I sort of wish I hadn’t even bothered to contact them, because it was my fault for attaching emotion to a piece of clothing. But I did take more than my share of the blame for this, and my friends were shocked at that. I think everyone was just generally appalled by the way they handled it. I still have all of the emails. I figured I might as well have everything, until I get my dress back. Which by the email I received this week, should be soon!

Although Sam doesn’t want me to, I thought of setting it on fire. My photographer has been looking for someone to light their dress on fire, I thought it would be fun to have a photo of me in my Indian wedding Lengha, lighting my McCaffrey on fire.

Truth is, that now that it’s done and over. The wedding, the unpleasantness with David, when I look at pictures, I’m still attached to it. MY emotions of the day are still invested in that white lace dress.

What prompted this long entry, was that earlier I was skimming through my past entries, and I came across one where I said that no matter what wedding we planned, I was meant to be an Indian bride, and I guess the universe agreed.