You Can Convince Yourself Of Anything

I’ve said it before: getting married is something I almost never do. I mean it. I’ve been married twice. In almost thirty-four years, it’s only happened twice. The first was as big a to-do as I’m ever gonna do; the second was an surprise elopement. God, I love surprises. For some people, it’s once down the aisle and that’s great. For some it’s none, and that fine too: not everybody wants to be married. For me, second time is the charm.

It’s that second point that I wanted to write a little about. My parents have been housing the physical remains of the first wedding: my heavily beaded gown, pictures, my planning files – those sorts of things. Since my sister was in the wedding – and is no longer in this world – my mom pulled all the photos so I could sort through them and take the ones with my sister back home with me.  So the gown has been sold secondhand, the files have all been tossed (who needs a list of caterers from the outer banks, along with notes on their availability from 2004?). But the pictures . . .  damn.

I’m stopped in my tracks by these pictures. Because – from these pictures – I  can tell that the man I married was not really happy the day he married me. In picture after picture I am giggling, laughing, posing and he is staring at the ground or into the distance. I am constantly smiling at him while he looks away with what I can only describe as a sort of zoned-out stoicism. In many of the photos he has his sunglasses on. There is one picture of the two of us, alone and standing apart with my arm fully stretched out resting on his shoulder. We are literally an arm’s length apart. I remember the moment well. It was right after the ceremony and he turned and asked something along the lines of What did we just do? And I said It will be alright.

When the Big Bridal Book of Photos came from the photographer in 2004, I convinced myself that the querulous man captured in those photos was really happy. I have some of the excuses right here: you see, the sun was in his eyes which explains the sunglasses. He was overcome with emotion and put on a straight, hard face so no one would see how close to crying he really was. But looking at these photos I see clearly that he wasn’t happy.

So how do you live your life knowing you are convincing yourself of something not quite true? Or do you live your life knowing that some things aren’t true, but don’t get bothered about it? Either way, here is the truth in this case: I convinced myself that he wanted to be married to me. He might have convinced himself too.

The pictures tell another story, one worth a million words, some of which are separation, divorce, remarriage.