22

two posts in one night, aren't you lucky? settle in. get a cuppa, glass of milk, bottle of wine- pick your poison. this could take a while. 

for anybody who also would like to catch up on their caravan girl reading, here's a link to the other pages from years gone by: https://www.blogger.com/profile/08782968177771499077

the cover image is one taken mere seconds ago. i got a new teddy, she's a bunny. i saw her on vinted for not very much money and her poor matted eyes made me so desperately sad i had to save her. she arrived days ago and we've been inseparable ever since. she is called sally. another girl who needs love. 

this is just a nice little intro for the rest of this post. anyway, get yourself settled <3

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gretna green- have you heard of it? to my understanding, it's the place in scotland where the young with forbidden love run to be betrothed to their sweethearts. when i was little i used to dream of becoming a child bride. running and running until callouses appeared on the soles of my bare feet- black and blue and violet bruises all over my heels after hours upon hours. but my thought was this- if i had run that far, then i would've made it to gretna green.

i work in a bridal shop now, and every day i'm there i get to watch another girl enter into one of three things; a future divorce, a partnership with the man she will make a steady life with, or (for the unbelievably rare few) the beginning of everything. 

one by one, these girls rifle through dresses and pick out different designs. ballgown, fishtail, fitted, etc. different straps, trains, veils, stitching, fabric, you name it. most of the time, the bride-to-be picks out around 6-8 dresses that she thinks will be beautiful. her maid of honour, her mother, her bridesmaids all gather onto the sofas and patiently wait as one-by-one they evaluate the dresses. they rate them out of ten. i like this material, but not this colour. i like the jewels but not the shape on my hips. i like this dress, but not that one. "i'm saying yes to the dress!". 

the hedonistic and completely shallow part of me craves this sport. i get involved. i say "and how does this dress make you feel?" "and what about this compared to the last one?" "so... are you saying YES to this DRESS????" yes, this is all rather fun and games to me & i am lucky enough to call it work that i get paid well over minimum wage to fulfil. but these girls, they did not dream of gretna like i did. like i do.

recently a girl came in to look for a dress. medium height & build, brunette, pale. for the life of me i can't conjure her face, and i don't think i'd be able to pick her out of a lineup if it was depended on, but this girl's name was Anna. she came in with her fiancé which is remarkably rare, and he was kind, polite, and unobtrusive. i explained to her that our dresses that are made-to-measure and are able to be ordered in were on the right, and our last-chance-to-buy and more inexpensive dresses were on the left. Anna thanked me and immediately headed to the left. the judgemental and cynical side of me immediately assumed her budget was small, and they were short on cash, but they did not discuss the price once.

instead, Anna slowly let herself consider each dress on the sale rail before pulling a dress so rarely picked i had forgotten it's existence. a simple thing with vintage lace and satin triangular straps, it was nothing to be talked over, except for the fact that unlike every other dress in the shop it was not ivory, but dusty pink. subtle, classy, but definitely pink. she guided the hanger off and away from the rail, and twirled it around to her partner. they exchanged nothing between them but a knowing smile, before she turned to me and asked to try it on.

in the changing room, "so, what was the proposal like?!" i asked with forced enthusiasm as i do with every bride. "oh" she replied, "it was perfect" and she nodded. i pressed her for more, "how did it happen?". she said that it was in their favourite spot, and he got down on one knee and asked her. and i felt so foolish. there were no cameras, no fireworks. he asked her, she said yes. love has become so grotesque. weddings. proposals. marriage. my job is to commercialise love. something told me that this was what love meant- what Anna had.

i sold Anna the dress, and asked her no more questions about her life with the man she had fallen in love with. they left the shop quietly together, hand in hand, and as they turned the corner she leant her head on his shoulder as they walked away. and i felt a dull thudding ache in the corner of my heart. 

the sanctity of Anna's brief window into her own private story shook me, and i went home that day in an odd sort of mood. i googled gretna green, the place for runaway lovers, and saw that it, too, had been marketed for profit, rather than in earnest. the "package deals" alone were truck loads of cash, and every couple in the pictures looked forced and out of place.

the next week, my colleague karen and i set about changing the window display. "how about," i said to karen, "we put a sale dress in the window? we never do that". "yes, that'll be nice" she said. i had never looked through them before, the sales dresses. to me, they were castaways from a sea of designer dreams- nothing compared to the pristine white of the right side of the shop. on that side, i had tried on all of the ones in the tiny sizes that i could- i had picked out a wedding dress for every kind of day for myself. a ballgown for a grand evening in bath, a fishtail for a boho barnyard bash, an off-the-shoulder floral fit when in rome. 

and so i lent my attentions, for once, to the left side. 

and i saw one.

the dress was creamy, with a few flowers here and there and little pearls dotted over it. the top cut like a t-shirt might around the neck, but straight down from the top of the shoulder to the underarm. the soft lace floated naturally, and the lack of a train held a folky impression for the already vintage frock. i hung it up above the others and intently studied it for a while, before enviously sliding it onto a mannequin. 

i let myself drift into daydreams as i often do, and saw a life in the dress i hadn't anticipated. i saw running with no shoes, and i saw gretna like i used to. a cold spring day just after the rain had come, a bouquet of path-picked flowers, and a spontaneous trip to the registry office. the smell of the bakery around the corner for a first pastry with a husband wearing a simple gold ring to match my own. in the creamy dress with a few flowers here and there and little pearls dotted over it. 

my hair i saw thick curls and messy, with a full heavy fringe for my un-burdened clear face. slightly rouged lips and floaty lashes, nothing more. a beaming smile. 

i imagined the intimacy of a two-person wedding, starting the two-person marriage. i imagined my bare feet and soft skin being carried through the door of a motel and a first dance stood on tip toes with a soft sway to whatever song, something stupid. laughter. dancing. quiet. soft. kisses all upon my fair skin and the whispers of my new name, now a wife to a friend- a soulmate. just like Anna.

when i got home after work, i sat and scrolled as i usually do and i came across a video of a girl and boy getting married in two days. "how do you feel?" she asks him on a camcorder. and i cried until my eyes hurt.

i fell asleep after that, and when i woke up i was still here. and nothing had changed. and the world kept turning. 

the dress remains on sale down at the bridal shop, and Anna has now been wed. she will most likely never come back to the place that sold her her gown, but forever she will go to the man she loves in the cold evenings. and i? well, i will always love that dress, and the life i could have in it.