The Wedding Saga Part 5

On Wednesday, I got my very first Mystic Tan. A sorority sister of mine who worked at a tanning salon once told me that she could get even me tan w/a Mystic Tan. I'd heard about it and my sister has had a few but I had not. Originally, we were going to get airbrushed tans and could not get wet for 24 hours but the choice was made to opt for a Mystic tan at a familiar location where appointments were not necessary.

Plus, my sister said she was self conscious about some pretty young woman getting to spray her with her not being "little & skinny." That was certainly not an issue for me; I figured I'd just be going along with the game plan anyway. Plus I have had to try on bras in large dressing areas where there was no private space and you had to disrobe in front of women you didn't know.

If you have an acting background, your personal boundaries are also different from the average person's since you have to be more up & close and personal with people as part of acting exercises and the like. It changes the bounds of your comfort zone. Because of this, I know for a fact I have no lesbian tendencies since those would have shown up a long time ago like when I was in high school theater or dance, where we had no formal changing areas and had 2 spaces on either side of the school's stage to change into things you couldn't get into discreetly like sports bras.

To get a Mystic Tan, you have to go into a booth by yourself after putting on barrier cream and, in our case, some hydrating lotion to make the tan spread evenly. One tip: they mean it when they say to use the barrier cream generously. My thumb looked dirty after my tan started showing.

I didn't realize how cold it would be. I had to work hard not to flinch when the spray was hitting me. I was holding my breath & felt shivery. At least next time I get it done, I'll know what to expect.

After this, we went to an event at my nephew's school. They were having their book bash, where the kids had made their own books to show the parents. My nephew had me, my husband, his parents and my parents in attendance. We even had our own little corner since there were so many of us. I think he had more people there to support him than any other kid in the class.

The only thing I didn't appreciate is my sister playing fashion police. My mother likes to do that to and I think it stems from being upset that I got more in the bust department than they did. For years, I've had to deal with both of them trying to play fashion police & telling me to dress like an old grandmother, never playing up my looks. I've thought of dressing like an old lady sometime just to bug them. The irony is that my sister was far more rebellious when it came to our conservative Christian upbringing; now she seems to have embraced it on some level while I rebelled more quietly.

Sounds simple to say "don't get wet for 6 hours", right? Not if you want a bottle of water and there's condensation to deal with. That was a pain for me at this event.

The upside is that while the tan didn't make me super brown I did go from looking like a ghost with red hair to a more normal person with red hair. I seriously have a Polaroid pic of myself from 10th grade where I look like a ghost with red hair and red painted fingernails.

The rest of that day and into Thursday, I got a break from the wedding stuff and got to spend quality time with my family members, especially my older nephew. My husband was teaching him bad habits but we did end up watching cartoons with him and exposing him to some classics he might not normally get to see. It also makes me feel good that he likes cartoons on Boomerang since I'd feel I failed if he became a teen and didn't know who Bugs Bunny was.

On Thursday, I got to visit my uncle. He's actually the only one who acknowledged my wedding and has a lot in common with my husband. They've wanted to meet one another for ages & finally got that opportunity. My cousin was working but everyone hoped they'd show up for the wedding. They did not.

This is largely because my uncle is somewhat reclusive and not the most social person. My mother is also like this to a lesser degree. I really should go find my cousin online and pester him for not taking the opportunity to get to see my husband in a tux since it will likely never happen again.

However, to this day none of my other relatives even said so much as "Congratulations" to me when I got married while going above and beyond for my sister. I've been married for nearly 5 years now, you know? I'm sure many of them even gave her wedding gifts. I've also felt like many of my family members seem to begrudge me living my own life and getting out of the South when I would have continued to be miserable if I'd stayed there & surely remained single for life.

Whether they actually do or not, I don't know but I've not felt the same kind of love or regard toward me that my sister has gotten.

So now we move to Friday, the night of the dress rehearsal. After some more spouse & me time, we have to go to the church in the evening. This is a real fun thing considering my husband isn't the least bit religious and apparently, neither are some of the groom's friends.

The best man showed up intoxicated. The other matron of honor decided to text through most of it and my aunt tried lumping me in as a bridesmaid while the ineffective matron of honor was hogging all the credit & getting to do EVERY LITTLE THING. The church was having a youth lockup that night.

For those thinking that a "youth lockup" is some kind of simulated prison experience, let me explain. A "youth lockup" is basically a slumber party where you stay in one room, hang out with others and sleep on the floor. I went to one at the same church when I was in the Girl Scouts and had fun. Maybe it's different when the specter of religion is introduced but it's not supposed to be practice jail.

My husband was also taken aback when told he'd be assisting on escorting people into the church, including the groom's mother whom everyone described as a piece of work. She vanished after one full rehearsal and others started to trickle out when food plans were still not finalized. My husband was starting to get hungry and the prospect of dealing with this pushy matron of honor didn't please me at all. Finally, my sister decides to go with her to go get food from a restaurant the matron of honor works at. By the time this happened, my husband had a headache from lack of food so we had to leave (I rode with him).

While we were having dinner at Steak & Shake, more fun starts happening:

1. Instead of asking where the men's room was, the best man decides to relieve himself outside in some of the church's bushes. Not sure if he was in view of the youths attending the youth lockup but people were pissed about that.

2. The other matron of honor decides to use the church's hot sauce after one of our bridesmaids told her she could. Never mind that this bridesmaid had nothing to do with the church. See tomorrow's entry for her reaction when confronted on this. It gets good.

3. After this, she says she's going off to meet with the aforementioned scumbag and will be back soon. She doesn't come back.

4. The bridesmaid from above used the church's ketchup but was contrite and apologetic after realizing she'd stolen from the church.

Now, all this happens after an earlier fight with this bridesmaid (who STILL did a better job at being the local matron of honor than the other one did) and with the groom's mother causing conflict, essentially by being as cheap as possible.

My mother and my sister also had to deal with printing programs after all this and ended up having to burn the midnight oil to get that taken care of. They got very little sleep the night before this wedding.

I'm still pissed we didn't go to "The Breakfast Club" and my husband jokingly tried to talk me into going to a strip club near where we'd had dinner. I suppose to bring my spirits up over having to deal with this whole wedding; with my luck, though, I'd have probably seen someone I know working there.

That evening, I thought "I will be away from this other matron of honor at the reception because I will sit with my family." (to my chagrin, that didn't end up happening). We didn't get to go because he didn't feel well and it was raining most of the day. I was even drenched in a downpour that happened after my husband got his hair cut that afternoon.

I proudly wore my shirt that says "Good Girls Go to Heaven, Bad Girls Go to New York" but had my hoodie over it because of the rain. No way was I dressing up and getting clothes ruined or pretending to be the good little Christian I wasn't. My mom claimed my shirt wasn't appropriate but I refused to change and said "It doesn't have profanity on it!" I could understand not wearing a shirt with the work "fuck" on it in a church but not the one I wore, right? If you can't have a sense of humor, you should fuck off & die. That is all.