#NewThisDay Writing From My Photo Stream

It was Frank’s idea. A couple of weeks ago. For our daughter to try on my wedding dress. I was surprised to learn she liked the idea when I brought it up. Since then, we have been waiting for the right day to open the sealed box and see if it has been preserved well enough for her to wear it, if she likes it. It has been sealed for almost thirty two years. I fell asleep early last night , exhausted, and woke in the early hours of the morning. My eyes opened to the bright almost full moon shining full force through my window onto my face. I stayed awake for some time and so I slept in, woke after Frank left for his morning meeting with his friend. Rain showered the river and the meadow and the forest as we walked into the morning through muddy May. Tired, still, and irritable, unfocused, it took me some time to really arrive in the woods – body, spirit, mind. After I reached the lady slipper bloom emerging, and knelt in the wet leaves to take a close look, I began to feel engagement, awareness, attention, focus. I forgot everything but the fresh rainy mold smell and the birds singing in my ears, and I felt such relief. There was so much to look at and appreciate. It rained harder, I slowed down. It rained on our wedding day. It was a Saturday in June and our reception was outdoors, in my parent’s yard, in the muddy field, under a tent. I ruined my lacy white pumps. My train dragged in the mud. I bought the dress at a wedding show at the Don Cesar Hotel in St. Petersburg, Florida during a trip to visit Frank the winter we were engaged and I was working at Brown. The dress was modeled in the show and when Frank and I saw it we felt it was the one. I called my mother and she said I could buy it. Both girls wanted to be here when we opened it today. Frank too. Suzi too. In the rainy swamp the white petals have sprinkled the surface and here they wilt and brown and rot and sink, sink into the muck and cycle back into the soil. The cardboard box was dirty with ages of dust. My mother had the mud cleaned out of my train and had the box sealed. I thought of her as we opened it, with gratitude for the care she took. Perri unsealed it, drew it out of the box. Some minor spots of yellow here and there, very little. Frank crossed the room, peered into the box. It needs to be freshened, ironed, restyled. But she likes it. Franci pulled and shaped it on her sister, showing her all the good ideas of how to make it her own. She wants to make it her own. My son’s fiance was down the hall and we called to her, she joined the fun. Soon enough she took out her box. Her mother’s dress, sealed. Waiting its turn.