Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Sunday was another big day for getting some stuff done for The Gryphon and I. He cooked us some French toast with actual French bread, and it was truly delicious. Then we headed out.

I dropped him off at his old apartment so he could spend the morning and the afternoon going through stuff there. He has until the end of the month to get completely out of his old apartment.

Then I drove to meet with the seamstress who will be fitting my bridesmaid dress for my sister's wedding. Her business is run out of her apartment, which is above an insurance office. She met me out front to make sure I knew I could park in the parking lot.

As soon as we got upstairs, she apologized for the apartment not being cool enough. But she had an air conditioner going, and I thought it was fairly comfortable, especially compared to how my office had been the early part of the week. I told her it was no problem.

A quick glance around the apartment revealed how busy she was. There were various formal dresses in bags, either hung up or laid out on tables and such. A corner of her kitchen was set up with several full-length mirrors so people could see their dress from all sides.

She had me change in her daughter's bedroom, who is apparently a teenager who is currently away. The room had little girlie flourishes like pink and purple objects and flowers, and the wall near her bed was covered with snapshots of her friends. A couple other formal dresses were hung on a hook on the door.

The seamstress spent most of her time pinning the sides of the bodice, which didn't surprise me, because it had been so loose. Despite the many pins it took, not one of them stuck me.

Then she started on the hem. I thought at first that she was hemming it too long, but she said that's actually the proper length for a formal dress. Besides, we could always make it shorter when I came back for my second fitting.

While she pinned she told me about some of the other work she's been getting. She was very busy in May with prom gowns, and right now she had a lot of weddings. But she's also doing an entire competition wardrobe for a Miss Pennsylvania contestant. I found this fascinating. She said it was really fun because the dresses were so different from what she usually works with.

She also makes garments from scratch when necessary, and she told me a story about a pregnant mother, in her 40's, who needed a dress for her oldest daughter's wedding. That was a bit of a challenge because she'd chosen a pattern that was too busy for someone who was obviously pregnant. The seamstress talked her out of it into a simpler material.

We also got to talking about dress sizes, me having noticed that the size of my dress, a 12, is two sizes larger than what I normally wear. I came to the conclusion that formal dresses are the one women's clothing item which hasn't fallen prey to vanity sizing. After all, I'm assured that, while Marilyn Monroe wore a size 12 in her day, it was closer to a size 8 today. That sounds about right.

All told, I was only there about half an hour. She told me I could pick the dress up at the same time next week. I could try it back on, and if there were any new alterations needed, she'd do them while I waited.

On my way back out of town, I stopped at a yard sale and got myself a teal zippered sweatshirt for only a quarter, a couple leather hip belts, and some sunglasses I can keep in the car as emergency sunglasses, for when I'm wearing my contacts.

I stopped at two more places: first at Subway to buy a sub for lunch; then at Target to get myself a couple more pairs of stockings. I only have one pair right now, and that's a recipe for disaster. They would almost be guaranteed to rip the moment I put them on for my sister's wedding.

While I was in Target, I checked out the clearance rack. I tried on a few things, most of which just didn't appeal to me. Then I saw a silk skirt in a teal and white pattern that looked kind of cute. It was a size 6 but looked like it would fit, so I decided to try it. What do you know? It fit perfectly. Even though I'm fairly convinced this particular skirt is just sized wrong, it still felt good to buy it. And it only cost $5.

Back home, I put together some of the containers we'd bought at IKEA and started organizing some of my stuff. I started with cassettes, many of which were air checks from my radio days. Partly through this, the phone rang. It was The Gryphon, asking me to pick him up.

Before I left, I fielded a call from my sister. She'd had another wedding related semi-disaster. The plants she'd bought as decorations for the wedding had developed spider mites. I just told her that if they weren't healthy enough for the wedding, she'd have to buy some more plants.

When I picked up The Gryphon, he had separated out a small amount of stuff he intended to keep. Everything else he'd gone through that day, he was going to get rid of. It seemed the process had taken a lot out of him, so I gave him a lot of hugs and told him how proud I was at all the work he'd done. We loaded up my car with some of his stuff and drove back home, just in time for me to do the one assignment I was doing that day.

Afterwards, we went out for dinner and a movie, me wearing my new skirt. We ate at the Marathon Grill, which is only about a year or so old and is attached to The Bridge movie theater. I wanted to sit outside and he wanted to sit inside, so we compromised, sitting at a table in an open doorway, with me on the outside and him on the inside. I had tuna steak with a lime sauce that was really delicious.

We saw Madagascar, the latest animated feature by Dreamworks. It was a lot of fun, but I don't think it will be the runaway hit that Shrek was. The story follows four zoo animals who fall off a transport boat and wash up on the shores of Madagascar. One of the best parts of the movie was the lemur king they encounter; great voice work and silly dialogue.

Between getting some things done and having a little fun, it was a good day.

Copyright 2005 by Alyce Wilson

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