Why "Say Yes To The Dress" Makes Me Cry

I love the TV program "Say Yes To The Dress". It's my guilty pleasure. Watching women of all ages choose their weddings gown is more than just fun. It's heartwarming and a bit embarrassing. It's sometimes downright maddening. And it's always touching.

There's a bride whose groom is deployed in Iraq. There's a bride with Stage IV breast cancer. There's a bride who's marrying a woman. There's a bride who's marrying for the first time at age fifty-three. There's a bride who's a total bitch and a control freak (and her fiance ends up dumping her before the wedding).

Lately, these stories make me cry.

Because nearly all of the brides shop for their dresses with their mothers. And in almost every case it's a time for some major bonding. The mother sees the daughter in the dress and that's it -- the two of them are sobbing and hugging and it's everything you ever dreamed it would be. A passing of the torch.

When I was thirty, I got engaged. (I later called it off.) My mother and I went shopping for a dress. She tried to steer me toward something simple. "An A-line will suit your figure," my mother said. What she meant was, "An A-line will fit you." She always thought I was fat.

I don't remember any of the dresses I tried on. I don't remember what I chose. I ordered something, I know that. It's amazing to realize this -- and even more amazing to write it where others might see it -- but I don't remember one thing about the experience at all. But I do remember what did NOT happen: my mother did NOT cry, my mother did NOT hug me, my mother did NOT tell me I'd make a beautiful bride.

It wasn't that kind of an experience for us. For me.

I've been thinking about this now that my mother is gone. I've concluded that the grieving process is as much about yearning as it is about missing.

While she was alive, I yearned to know that my mother thought I was beautiful and a wonderful daughter and everything she'd ever wanted and more. I yearned for her to throw her arms around me and hug me, telling me she loved me this much (arms open wide) today and that much (arms open wider) tomorrow. That was never going to happen. But for as long as my mother was alive, that possibility existed.

And so when I sit in my living room and cry through episodes of "Say Yes", I know what those tears are about. They're about those moments my mother and I never had and were never going to have. For the boundaries that framed our relationship. For the yearning that remains even when the missing begins. For the love I feel despite the disappointments.

Accepting that and still loving...that is something remarkable.