Just Breathe!!

I just heard this great story about a maid of honor who left her

special wedding day shoes on the shuttle from the salon to the

church. When the maid of honor realized what had happened

she confessed to the bride, "I left my shoes on the shuttle..."

Supposedly, the bridesmaids were terrified of how the bride was

going to react. Nothing had gone majorly wrong all day, even

though weddings can be thought of as nerve-wracking, this

bride had remained calm throughout the minor bumps of the

day thus far... so everyone was expecting her to freak out.

This was supposed to be the straw that broke the camels back.

The bride replied, "Ok, well you can wear my ceremony shoes

and I'll put on my reception shoes early."

The bridesmaids were in a state of shock and haze of confusion

with how smoothly the transition took place. No one thought to

look at it from the bride's perspective; how happy she was to get

out of her uncomfortable ceremony shoes and into her comfy

dancing shoes. Just a minor speed bump in the grand scheme of

things... the pictures weren't ruined by a shoeless maid of honor

and no one even realized the bride's shoes did not match her

bridesmaids because her wedding dress was long enough to cover

the comfortable dancing shoes. It is humorous how often these

types of situations happen during the course of wedding festivities

and brides handle the 'emergency' with perfect composure.

At my own wedding, a similar scenario kept repeating itself:

tardiness. I am usually not the most punctual person anyways,

but when it is your wedding weekend you put in a little more

effort to be on time. The unforeseen factors are really what

contributed to consistent lateness: a bridesmaid not having

shoes that matched her outfit for the rehearsal dinner, being

from out of town and not knowing the 'rush-hour' traffic to

avoid, worrying about my out-of-town relatives getting lost, etc.

After five phone calls and an unlimited number of text messages

from my family, in-laws and fiance, (who were already at the

church waiting for us), about how late my bridesmaids and I

were to the rehearsal ceremony, I realized my knuckles where

white because I was gripping my cell phone so tightly. Even

though I was not freaking out on the outside, internally I was

a little stressed out. One of my bridesmaids sitting next to me

must have felt the stress vibe resonating from my direction

because she asked sternly, "Are you alright?"

I was alright, and looking back at the wedding weekend,

running late to things is not something that sticks out on the

importance list. Weddings aren't perfect, and things might not

go exactly as they are planned. The important thing is to breathe

so you can think clearly and come to a resolution; negativity

and freaking out only make bad situations worse.

So, as with most wedding tales, the moral of the stories

can be applied to everyday life as well: being calm is way

more beneficial than freaking out.