When my son Jack announced his engagement, my friend gave me some great advice. She said: The wedding is not about you.
I was thrilled when Jack asked me to tag along to look for a ring. Lordo’s showed him lots of options, including the most beautiful estate piece I’ve ever seen: it looked like something Daisy Buchanan would wear. I could not get it out of my mind. I talked about it, showed pictures of it and maybe even had a dream about it. Since this was a December engagement, a friend suggested I just buy the ring for myself, you know as a Christmas and early birthday present. So about 4 minutes later I arrived at a very crowded Lordo’s and they said, “Your son wants the ring?” “No, I want the ring.” They chuckled, sized the ring and off I drove thinking, OK, maybe the wedding wasn’t about me, but I managed to get a ring out of the engagement!
A month or so later, my future daughter-in-law, Lisa, made me the happiest person in the world by saying the following: “Patty, you know the reality show, Something Borrowed, Something New? Well, I am interviewing to be on it and I’d like you to be part of the tape I need to submit.” I have always wanted to be on a reality show; Andy Cohen is my god. This was even better than the ring!
The premise of this show is about a bride wanting to wear her mother’s wedding dress, but with some style modifications. She is flown to L.A., where the dress is remade and restyled to fit her. Now here’s where the tension comes in: She also has the option of picking a new dress selected for her by the show’s stylists. Lisa’s mom had worn her mother’s wedding dress, so this had the possibility of being a three-generation dress.
To get in the mood for the taping, I pulled out my wedding dress. As I looked at it, I realized something I have always known: my wedding dress is a big fashion no-no. It is polka dotted and puffy, and includes a hat. It was in style for exactly one year, 1983. There is no chance my daughter will be wearing my wedding dress.
Back to the tape. It was heartfelt. It included the grandmother talking about how she found the dress in a magazine and placed it on layaway. Her daughter, Denise, talked of always wanting one of her girls to wear the dress; Lisa’s sisters reminisced about playing dress-up with it; and I, the crazy mother-in-law (wearing my wedding hat) mentioned how happy I was about the engagement and how I managed to get a new ring out of it.
The next thing you know, all of us are doing phone interviews. The producers of the show loved the tape, and boy, did I take the interview seriously! I talked about how beautiful Lisa is. We discussed how cute her grandmother is and how flawless Denise’s skin looks. They told Lisa to keep her calendar open for dates in May.
Then we waited. We waited some more. And then Lisa was told by the producers, “We have decided to go in a different direction.” What?!? Are you kidding me? Which direction are you going? And that’s when I realized we were not reality show material.
Lisa’s family is too normal and nice. There was not enough drama—no threats that ‘she better wear the dress,’ no mention of not attending the wedding ‘unless.’ The craziest they would get with this wedding was me wearing an outdated wedding hat and talking about my ring. My dreams of reality show stardom were crushed. And that’s just fine. Because by son is marrying into a family that cannot get on a reality show, and that makes me very happy. Plus, I need to remember that both the wedding and this reality show are not about me.
That said, if a reality show ever comes calling again, I will certainly put my crazy pants on and do what I need to do to become a member of the cast.
