The Women

My favorite scene in just about any wedding movie, ever, starts at about 03:00:

For some, weddings call to mind many "father of the bride" type images, but in my family, it's the women that really hold it all together. We are very close knit. Here we are nearly 10 years ago, at my senior piano recital in college. There are four generations represented here. I am in the blue dress. Sadly, my great grandmother (on the far right) died a few years after this picture was taken.

My mother and grandmother visited me a few months ago, and I got a chance to take them to the wedding venue. We walked around, me showing them where things would be, and Mom and Grandmother suggesting things along the way. At the same time it was an almost out-of-body experience, as I listened to the three of us excitedly chattering, visualizing. Three generations of women, planning a wedding. One day, me and Mom and my daughter will do this. It is universal, and timeless, and it has been happening forever, and here it is, my turn. I think there is something magical about this.

I love that scene of the Greek Wedding movie because it speaks to that moment that is at once deeply personal and universal; that is at once the past and present; to the bonds we do or don't share with our mothers; to the idea that women have been going through this rite of passage forever; to what it means to be a wife and a woman and a mother.

Being a bride, in this society and in many others, means accentuating everything there is about femininity, womanhood, and application of past traditions into your own future role as "wife." There is usually some internal struggle involved, some confrontation, and hopefully some thought given to the women who have gone through the exact same thing one or two generations ago. I credit the women in my family for so much of who I am, and I think that on my wedding day, I will represent all of them when I stand at the altar.

This idea has been even more significant for me this week, as my grandmother was admitted to the hospital with some very serious health issues. While she is doing better, we aren't sure at all whether she'll be able to travel to the wedding.

I was looking for some pictures of her and I remembered this one from our engagement party. I call it "All My Moms." My mom is on the left, grandmother in the middle, and, as I am now proud to add another "mom" to my family, Mr. O's mother on the right. She had just finished telling an embarrassing story about him, and we were all laughing.

In the background are Mr. O and his father, standing around looking alike, no doubt talking about those laughing women on the other side of the room. Well, what do they expect? When we are not thinking about our timelessness or strengthening the bonds of womanhood, that is what we do! (ha!)

Becoming a wife means many things to many people. How are you sorting out what it means for yourself? How similar is your version of "wife" to those of the women you have grown up with? What was your "Greek Wedding woman" moment?