Besting Barbie?

After a hectic holiday filled with much of the usual fare and the official announcement of my recent engagement to my family, I’m still recovering… The fact that I’m engaged has slowly but surely sunken in and now I’m just trying to enjoy it while it lasts. Still, the nagging questions of when and where and how are all flying at me relentlessly. For example, I was asked by at least 3 people on the day after M popped the question whether or not we’d set a date yet. YET?!?! Do people usually set a date in under 36 hours?? Nevertheless – and in spite of whatever today’s current trends are - I’m taking this in stride and cautiously so.

So how does engaged life differ from dating life? Well, aside from having a notably large diamond ring that by far bests any other piece of jewelry I’ve ever owned in my entire life on my left hand, and aside from dodging the aforementioned questions, hoping I don’t blind anyone on the metro with my newest accessory, feeling a deeper attachment and security in my relationship with M, and having to tell and re-tell the story of our engagement to countless others, I’d say it’s pretty similar. :)

I must admit, however, that it is taxing. A recent rush of newly engaged co-workers has succeeded in putting every issue from dresses to rings to flowers front and center and making each of them entirely unavoidable. Not that I’m being evasive in anyway. I am - truth be told - a devotee of browsing TheKnot.com and WeddingChannel websites obsessively. I’ve also taken heart in the fact that I can now live vicariously through my rail-thin co-worker (the model) by clipping every gown I wish I were a foot and a half taller to wear and passing it to her each morning. It’s more fun than playing Barbie ever was!

But the real fun will begin this weekend… when I discover for myself what the infamous designer “trunk show” is all about. I’ve been informed to bring with me magazine clippings of what I’d like to look like. I’m wondering whether or not they’ll be amused when I show up with pictures of gowns fit for tall, waif-like women that are twice my height. I’m 4’10 1/2'” (and no one will deprive me of that half!) – but so what? That can’t be what I want to look like?! Who among us doesn’t want to look like a towering model? Forgive my dabbling in stereotype, but really now…

Though it was my nickname in summercamp for many years when I was younger (and probably the same height!), whether or not I’m ready for the role of Barbie quite yet is to be seen -- but Lord knows, I’m enjoying every minute of it. That is... until I see myself in blaring unforgiving pale white tulle. That will be another story… Stay tuned!