I Smelled Like Pee at the Wedding
Fromm, seventh-grade wedding dresses, and why it's okay to be mortified
I’m working on this super secret project (I’m only saying that to make it sound cool, honestly) and I was trying to mine my past in order to get some material.
Warning: Mining my past for material is such a bad idea.
Pogie the Dog: Don’t do it, Carrie! It’s not worth it.
Sorry, Pogie an authentic writer has to do what she has to do. Plus, I need to blog.
The set-up:
I was in seventh grade.
My stepfather had just died. It was my brother’s wedding.
I was totally in love with Tim, my much older (at an ancient 22) step-cousin. He had nice hair and really white teeth.
The dress:
Was two sizes too big. I lost a lot of weight because my dad died.
Was this Pepto-Bismol pink
Required a hoop skirt.
Had fake flowers for shoulder straps.
Was tiered like a wedding cake.
What happened:
Right before the wedding, at the house of the parents of the bride, I put on my horrible gown. It sagged everywhere, including where my breasts were (still are, actually. My breasts have not. I repeat: HAVE NOT moved) and the maid of honor was trying to duct tape the side in. It didn’t really work and the tape was scratching. Then when we were heading out to the car I picked up their dog, Midge. It turns out you are not supposed to pick up Midge. Why?
Midge pees.
Midge peed all over the dress. There was this dark stain, going down the side of my pink atrocity. My cousin Tim was totally going to see me in this dress that now had PEE on it! PEE!
Cue: Mother of the bride swearing.
Cue: Maid of Honor yelling, “YOU PICKED UP MIDGE! JESUS! JESUS!”
They rushed me inside, dabbed at me with a face cloth and then dried me with a hair dryer and sprayed a whole lot of Lysol on me. It was fragrant and killed airborne bacteria, but it didn’t mask the smell of the Midge.
Me: I smell like pee.
Bride: YOU. SMELL. FINE.
Father of the Bride: She smells like piss.
Cue: Maid of Honor spraying lilac perfume all over me on top of the Lysol.
So, I went to the wedding smelling like Lysol, lilac, and pee. My super cute cousin asked me to dance. I was in Heaven. He leaned in. I was in Super Heaven of Awesomeness. My step cousin of the handsome hair was leaning in. I am ready to die of bliss.
He says, “Does it smell like urine here?”
I am mortified. I keep dancing.
WHY TELL THIS STORY, CARRIE? THAT’S WHAT YOU’RE THINKING RIGHT?
I’ve told this story before. Why?
Well, it’s because it’s embarrassing, and I like to lean into the awkward and embarrassing moments of my life because:
They are usually funny.
It gives me a bit of power over them.
Maybe other people can relate?
THE GOAL IS TO BE WHO YOU ARE AND THAT INCLUDES YOUR EMBARRASSING BITS
Frances Moore Lappé once said, “I think that fear of embarrassment is the essence of the human challenge.”
When we’re afraid of being embarrassed, we start to live by fear. When we’re afraid of the people acting like ghouls out there (or even just afraid of being excluded from an invite or something), it shapes who we are.
It is better to be weird and authentic and true to who you are than to worry about being cool. It is better to be able to laugh at dorky and embarrassing moments than to react with anger to them. And it is so easy to lash out when you’re embarrassed, right?
Erich Fromm wrote The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness a few decades ago. He’s had some great quotes and thoughts.
“The task we must set for ourselves is not to feel secure, but to be able to tolerate insecurity,” he writes.
And he also wrote this one, “If other people do not understand our behavior-so what? Their request that we must only do what they understand is an attempt to dictate to us. If this is being 'asocial' or 'irrational' in their eyes, so be it. Mostly they resent our freedom and our courage to be ourselves. We owe nobody an explanation or an accounting, as long as our acts do not hurt or infringe on them.”
It is okay to be you. It is okay to smell like pee because you couldn’t resist a cute dog. The horrifying embarrassment of things? It usually doesn’t last, not if you can find that place inside of you that feels calm and true and good, that place that sort of resonates with joy when you see a Midge or a sunset or a child on a holiday morning.
That’s what matters. You are what matters.