No, no-- start over. Again.
Nov. 4th, 2004 12:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ysobelleI feel like my voice has been stripped from me. But I also feel like I've done it to myself.
It's not just last night, though last night is another weight on the scales of poor-me vs. happy-happy. It's just this sometimes overwhelming feeling of being constantly thwarted, of unending frustration and helplessness. It's been worse, I know. I've spent much of the last year, I think, embroiled in it. It reached a sort of airless, black-of-night nadir a month or so ago, and I believe it was probably due to my subconscious unquietly waiting for the axe to fall. Now that it has, though I'm gouged to the core and bleeding all over the carpet, there's a measure of calm.
(A pause to go run with my dog.)
It's a bit, I suppose, like the dreadful calm after a loved one's protracted struggle with death. There's the bewildering loss, and the grief and rage, but the almost guilty relief that finally, finally, there's no more sadistic carousel of hope and despair. Oh, yes, this is as much last week as last night.
Jay and I were discussing bridal shows-- doing them as a team and splitting the costs. I went online to do some research, and felt hopelessly out of my depth, as if one could truly drown in white tulle and smug wedding planners. I realised, sadly, that while I'm all for moving on and building my future, it's bitter right now to look at happy photos of beaming newlyweds looking towards their own futures together.
I think I never rationally expected to marry him, but the dewy-eyed idealist in me looked ever towards him with a "whither-thou-goest" gaze. One day, yes, yes, I shall lodge in a new land, but for now, I'll pitch my tent here by the water and sit a while. I have much to think about.
It's not just last night, though last night is another weight on the scales of poor-me vs. happy-happy. It's just this sometimes overwhelming feeling of being constantly thwarted, of unending frustration and helplessness. It's been worse, I know. I've spent much of the last year, I think, embroiled in it. It reached a sort of airless, black-of-night nadir a month or so ago, and I believe it was probably due to my subconscious unquietly waiting for the axe to fall. Now that it has, though I'm gouged to the core and bleeding all over the carpet, there's a measure of calm.
(A pause to go run with my dog.)
It's a bit, I suppose, like the dreadful calm after a loved one's protracted struggle with death. There's the bewildering loss, and the grief and rage, but the almost guilty relief that finally, finally, there's no more sadistic carousel of hope and despair. Oh, yes, this is as much last week as last night.
Jay and I were discussing bridal shows-- doing them as a team and splitting the costs. I went online to do some research, and felt hopelessly out of my depth, as if one could truly drown in white tulle and smug wedding planners. I realised, sadly, that while I'm all for moving on and building my future, it's bitter right now to look at happy photos of beaming newlyweds looking towards their own futures together.
I think I never rationally expected to marry him, but the dewy-eyed idealist in me looked ever towards him with a "whither-thou-goest" gaze. One day, yes, yes, I shall lodge in a new land, but for now, I'll pitch my tent here by the water and sit a while. I have much to think about.
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no subject
Date: 2004-11-04 04:40 pm (UTC)Although it may be painful, bridal shows may be a good step to getting MayFaire Moon closer to finacial independence. Brides will pay STUPID amounts of money for dresses, and Medieval/Renaissance weddings are so popular nowadays.
Of course, you have to balance that out with the stress of dealing with brides. So you may end up reinvesting all of your profits in prozac, pot, or whiskey - whatever your escape is. ;)
no subject
Date: 2004-11-04 05:05 pm (UTC)What ARE your worst bridal experiences out there?
For a few years now, I've been trying to see if I can collect some interesting stories on brides from hell (other than just the bridezilla stuff), and after my own wedding two years ago, got this idea to write a bridal guide to planning a wedding... full of humorous anecdotes from assorted weddings I've either been at or known people at... Humorous NOW. I'm sure they weren't quite so funny at the time... *smirk*
Anyone wanna help? ;)
no subject
Date: 2004-11-04 05:19 pm (UTC)A woman ordered three dresses: her wedding dress and two bridesmaid's dresses. She came down from MD (I think) to have her measurements taken - even though I told her that was totally unnecessary, she could have her measurements taken by a professional tailor and sent to me.
She makes a deposit on the dresses, fine.
I make the dresses and deliver them to the woman approximately 2 months before the wedding. She calls in a fit of rage, stating that NOTHING fits correctly. I am confused, since I made the dresses to suit the clients, and they're all side-lacing kirtles, which have lots and lots of room to "fudge" measurements.
She is now two months out from her wedding. She refuses to send the original dresses back, but insists that I make NEW ones, send them to her, and THEN she'll send the original dresses back. We go back and forth - I'm obviously VERY uncomfortable doing this. I finally agree to do so on the condition that she sends a certified, notarized letter indicating that she will send the original dresses back upon receipt of the new dresses.
I tell her to lay the dresses out, and give me *exact garment measurements* she wants the new dresses to be made to. I alos insist on photos so that I can see where the alterations need to be made.
I recieve letter, measurements, and photos. Although I gave them explicit instructions on how to wear the dresses, they did not follow them - to point, there was no "fluffing", and the bridesmaid's breasts were firmly laced into the dress, and it looked miserable. Fluffing would solve the problem nicely.
But, as per our agreement, I made the new dresses and sent them out. Client sent the original dresses back, with a firmly worded letter stating that they were STILL not happy with the dresses (although now she won't say what she's not happy about, just that she's not happy), but were now in a bind because the wedding was only a month away, and would have to make do with what they had. (ie: the dresses would be used in the wedding) Because of their time, energy, and emotional anguish, they refused to pay the balance due - about $150. On top of all that, they reported me to the Better Business Bureau of NC.
Note: during this whole process, I continuosly offered to give them a full refund upon receipt of the original dresses. Never once did I insist that they continue to do business with us - on the contrary, I tried to push them into accepting the refund, because I knew I could NOT make this client happy.
So she reports me to the BBB. I call the BBB and inform them that the client had received replacement dresses and still refused to pay the balance owed, and that during the whole ordeal I repeatedly offered the client a full and complete refund upon return of the garments. The BBB said "she's a crackhead" in so many words, but still has to process the claim. So, if you pull up my business in the NC BBB, I'm listed as having one complaint against me that has been resolved.
This happened early on in the business - and left a very sour taste in my mouth for dealing with brides.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-04 06:06 pm (UTC)I'm sorry that was never completely resolved to your favor...
Me, I was actually a fairly easy bride. It was my motherinlaw who was getting annoying... ;)
The only thing I got pissy about were my favors. I bought them on ebay, and was very happy about the idea of getting these cute silver plated victorian keys that doubled as church keys (bottle openers), I was going to tie little ribbons to them that said something along the lines of the keys to a happy marriage...
I ordered them four months in advance.
Two weeks later, I got a mikasa cake server in the mail. I notified the company that they'd sent the wrong package to the wrong place, please tell me where to ship the cake server back to, and I would please like my keys.
They told me they couldn't locate them, but as soon as they did or as soon as they got a new shipment. She never told me where to send the cake server back to, despite my asking twice.
A week later, they hadn't gotten a new shipment, and still hadn't located the stuff (I can pretty much assume she didn't get my keys back the same way she never got the cake server back, she just didn't bother). She said that I could either wait, since they might get more in soon, or I could get a refund. I told her I'd wait, since there were still three months to the wedding.
A month later, I email them back, since I still haven't gotten anything and I haven't heard from them in a month. She said they hadn't gotten them yet.
one more month goes by, I hear nothing from them, and still, no favors. At this point I'm starting to get a bit nervous, since there's now only a month until the wedding, and I flat out said in my email that it should not take this long for them to get in a new shipment. She never even responded to my letter, but my paypal was suddenly refunded.
Mind you, we are now a month away from the wedding, and I have no favors. Yes, my money was refunded, but I would rather have the items than the refund. Had she told me that it would take that long, I'd've taken the refund two months earlier, and just gotten something else, since she wouldn't have been able to guarantee me getting it on time.
I think it was understandable that I left her negative feedback on ebay. I said she mis-shipped the item to someone else, had little communication, and I got my refund two months later when she finally admitted she couldn't get any more.
And she retalliated with negative feedback saying I wasn't understanding enough.
Okay, you've got a bride in the middle of one of the more stressful periods in her life, all you had to do was put a bunch of keys in a box and ship them to the right location, you screw that up, and the person on the receiving end isn't understanding enough? Waiting two months because of their screwup and being very patient about it until a month before the wedding isn't understanding enough?
Yeah, I had all kinds of things that screwed up at my wedding... The cake was yellow frosting on white cake instead of white frosting on yellow cake (hubby can't have chocolate)... The tent was BLUE. Okay, I laughed it all off instead of stressing out over it, the tent was borrowed and blue, and my grandmother told me there was some superstition in the carribean about having yellow at a wedding being good luck, and so I figured at least someone was happy with the cake, so I wasn't going to fuss. MIL wigged out halfway through the bbq reception that we ran out of hot dogs. I was of the opinion that while it was a shame there were no dogs left, I wasn't going to stress over it.
Brides do tend to get pissy and irrational around the time of the wedding, because there are too many things to think about and not enough help usually, and I'll admit that. But I don't think it was unreasonable of me to hope that if she thought she couldn't get them on time, she'd tell me this.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-04 08:29 pm (UTC)My hubby has always said to me that I should put together a book about what *not* to do when you plan a wedding.
If you want, get my email address from ysobele & write me. Maybe I can share a funny story or two w/ you for your book.