Pure anxiety and unadulterated joy jostled for prominence in my psyche, while utter exhaustion addled my senses and revealed itself in the dark, puffy bags under my eyes. Though I had fallen asleep instantly upon arriving back at the apartment close to 5 a.m., excitement roused me, like a child on Christmas morning, just a couple hours later.
My anxiety had nothing to do with getting married — I was gleeful about being legally bound to the love of my life. It had everything to do with the fact that I had zero control over the day's events and little more than a foggy concept of what to expect. While I had planned and unplanned every aspect of the cancelled wedding in Calgary, I had been involved peripherally at best in the planning of the wedding in Douala and found myself unable to answer even the most basic questions from my parents about the day, the ceremony, the program. The stress was also certainly amplified by the early a.m. dress debacle.
I got up to wash and tried, in vain, to focus on my morning scripture study. I dropped to my knees on the rug beside the bed, but my mind kept wandering in that ephemeral state between sleep and wakefulness: too tired to carry on a proper conversation with God, too excited to just crawl back into bed. I slunk down to my heels, my head collapsed on my folded arms on the mattress, and sat there for a good long while, trying to muster up the energy to match my racing head and heart.
The first truly bitter notes rang loud soon after my parents left to go get my mom's dress fitted across town. Though I had prepared myself mentally for how different our wedding would be from what I had always hoped for or pictured, and did my best to focus on the numerous ways things would be so much more special and unique than I had ever dared imagine, there was one crucial aspect I hadn't considered. Alone in a rented apartment on a stuffy December morning on the other side of the world, I was struck profoundly by how different the getting ready process would be. I'd imagined a morning of professional pampering with my mom and closest girlfriends, singing along to early 2000's pop and sipping on pina coladas while we laughed and reminisced.
Instead, I sat alone, in my underwear, on the edge of the bed, engulfed by silence but for the ambient noises gradually growing in the neighbourhood below. Roosters crowed, taxis honked, music blared distantly and I zoned out for what could have been three minutes or 30. Accompanied by only a stinging loneliness and sense of loss so poignant I could do nothing but channel it into irritation bordering on anger, then I berated myself for not pushing away the negativity on this long-awaited, glorious day.
I swallowed repeatedly to break up the lump forming in my throat. I blinked back the tears that threatened. Tears of melancholy, tears of rage, tears of elation. The fatigue and nerves were making me nauseous and I couldn't eat. I fought the urge to call Steve, wondering how he was and what he was doing.
Eventually, I began to absently draw my brush through my wet, tangled, extension-laden hair, then pulled it back into a heavy ponytail and sectioned it, winding the pieces over and around each other to create one thick braid down my back. I leaned over to grab the small vanity mirror and sat back against the headboard, staring critically into my dour reflection.
Wooooow, I thought, as every blemish came into stark relief. This is definitely why tired, cranky brides should not have to face their own face on their wedding day.
I tweezed the stray hairs around my eyebrows and plucked the pesky dark ones on my chin. I poked at the circles under my eyes and tried to remember techniques for hiding them. Finally, I began applying my makeup with one hand, clutching the mirror's purple plastic stand in the other. I applied my simple, every day look — the only one I know how to do, then went a little heavier on the eye shadow and bronzer to try to take it up a notch.
Well, that's as good as it's gonna get, I thought as I took one last appraising look, then leaned back and waited.
It was approaching noon by the time my parents got back, with my new dress in tow. It was simple and beautiful, almost exactly as I had pictured it. Better yet, it fit perfectly. A couple of women, close friends of my in-law's, arrived to help iron the dress and tie my headwrap. Soon, we were on our way.
My parents and I were ushered into a rented vehicle, beautifully decorated in exquisite tropical flowers and maroon ribbon. The excitement of finally being on the move initially cut through the frustration of the slow-going traffic and the anxiety of the veritable hive of activity at town hall where 16 other weddings were happening that day (yes, for real).
It was a simple waiting game from there. Since I had asked for a private ceremony and we had missed our allocated morning slot, we had no real timeline, and just had to wait for the most convenient opening. See, a civil ceremony at town hall is required by Cameroonian law, and couples typically go before the mayor (who officiates the ceremony) three or four at a time, in a sort of mass wedding ceremony. Meanwhile, all of their guests crowd into the ceremony room, each party distinguishable by their outfits, which are typically made of the couple's selected wedding fabric (pagne).
In the right situation, I don't mind being the centre of attention (hello blog!) but — shocker — I don't actually love being in the spotlight when I feel out of my element. Lived experience had taught me that I was often stared at in Cameroon, cause of my dang Nordic pale skin and blonde hair, and also that I found it deeply uncomfortable. While the social justice advocate in me feels like such discomfort is an important insight into the privilege I have as a white woman living in the "west", it was something I felt justified in trying to cap on my wedding day by limiting the staring eyes to those of our own wedding guests.
In any case, we sat there for hours, my car parked in front of Steve's (mercifully, with air conditioning), while various wedding guests (many of whom had been waiting in the humid heat since 9 a.m.) milled by the cars to see us and speak with us. My self-consciousness climbed as I imagined condemnation in their innocuous greeting and gentle ribbing about "exaggerating Black man's time".
Look at this selfish European, I imagined them thinking (because North Americans and Europeans are virtually interchangeable to most Cameroonians), inconveniencing us all with an immature hissy fit about her dress, and indulgent demands for a private ceremony!
Of course, if anyone actually thought that they certainly didn't say it to my face. Still, I was wracked by waves of guilt and anxiety. I should have just worn my ivory dress. Now everyone is going to hate me and think I'm spoiled.
Then the guilt took on a frustrated edge. I'm sorry I didn't want to wear a dress that made me look like a horror show. If I had known it would cause such a cascade of challenges, I would have worn the ivory dress!
Then a new feeling began to emerge, a sort of righteous indignation over the imagined slight. This day is just as painful for me as it is wonderful. Why does everyone keep saying that it's my day and it should be how I want it if they're going to give me a hard time for asking for one thing to make the day less anxiety-inducing? It's not like I even asked for much... a dress that doesn't make me feel like crap, a private ceremony, a few specific songs for the reception, proper wedding photos, real flowers for my bouquet. That's it. Everything else was suuuuuper flexible. I am literally the furthest thing from a bridezilla.
The wheels spun in my mind, my anxiety and frustration and sense of helplessness grew, and still, we waited.
Around 3 p.m.Steve's sister came outside to tell us we would be next.
Then she came back a moment later to tell us that one of the waiting brides had gone into labour and the administrators were pushing up their ceremony so the paperwork could be signed before the couple went to the hospital. So we waited some more.
Finally, finally, we were called inside and Steve and I were able to interact for the first time all day. We gripped each other's hands as we sat on a wooden bench outside the ceremony room, and all the other emotions faded into happiness, peace, confidence and anticipation. We said nothing but exchanged a lifetime's worth of hopes and promises through our locked eyes, interlaced fingers and ever-expanding dopey grins. I genuinely wish a camera could have adequately captured the look in his eyes just then. It was a look that could have calmed a thousand raging storms of anxiety, quelled any doubt, relieved any pain. More even than the moment we said "I do" (or, more accurately, "Oui"), this little moment of intimacy stands out as one of the most precious memories of my entire life.
Once all our guests were seated, we were lead to the ceremony room and we walked down the aisle. Music blared, our guests whooped and trilled shrilly on supposedly verboten plastic whistles. Several reached out and clapped us on the back as we passed, smiling their well-wishes on us with unrestrained joy. I felt the prickle of salt in my eyes as we passed my mom, who reached out and rubbed my shoulder, smiling with red-rimmed eyes. I spotted dad on the far end of the front row (as the head of my family, he had a designated spot), his emotions also evident in his expression.
Once at the front, we had to dance. To get around the discomfort I focused only on Steve, saw nothing but him and the tension receded. It even started to be a little bit fun. My smile grew wider still, so wide it hurt. After a while, we were invited to sit on chairs at the front of the room. Our backs were to the crowd and I realized with a pang that I was grateful I didn't have to look around the room throughout the ceremony, seeing all the faces that could not be there.
The MC began with a corny but endearing acrostic poem out of our names (or in my case, my middle name, since most people there find it much easier to pronounce. Even Steve calls me Michele more often than not). We all stood to acknowledge the mayor as he entered to officiate and I cringed internally, a little queasy at the memory of the sexist overture he had provided at our friends' wedding the previous May. Gratefully, his soliloquy was markedly less discriminatory this time around (references to the civil code identifying the husband as head of the family, with the sole right to determine domicile notwithstanding).
He completed his remarks by confirming the details for our marriage certificate, not the least of which was whether our marriage would be open to new parties in the future. (Spoiler alert: Not in this lifetime!) Yep, our marriage certificate literally has a box checked for "monogamy" because polygamy is a very real option in Cameroon. In fact, if monogamy is not specified, polygamy is essentially the legal default.
We were asked to stand and invited to accept each other as husband and wife (we did), exchange rings (we did), say a little something to each other (we did... though my elated but overwhelmed mind couldn't do more than stammer out a couple ineloquent sentences in English) and kiss (we did).
Our guests cheered, the music began to boom again and we signed nine copies of the hand-filled marriage certificate before shuffling outside to the garden for some photos. All at once, the fatigue and anxiety came rolling back. Our guests surrounded us for photos. People outside the wrought iron bars of the garden stared intently. I could see my parents off to one side, unable to get through the crowd to me and I was irked: they had just sat through a whole ceremony they didn't understand for their first child, their only daughter; they had no other family present to share this special moment with, and they were prevented from being amongst the first to congratulate us. I was also worried: my mom has hypoglycemia and the unexpectedly long day had likely made things uncomfortable for her at the very least. Frustration gripped me harder as the fading daylight alerted me to the fact that we would not be getting the proper photos I'd hoped for. There was no time anyway, we were hours behind schedule for the church ceremony and still had the reception to think about. Suddenly, I was completely overwhelmed. I just needed to go.
Steve and I climbed into the waiting car and I was simultaneously irritated by the fact that my parents were riding with us (I craved even just 30 seconds truly alone with my new husband) and overcome by a strong desire to be in their presence, not to be separated from them. I was all conflicting emotions: exhausted, stressed, anxious, frustrated, euphoric, grateful, awed... All of them collided and mingled as we crawled along through traffic, the late afternoon melting away to darkest evening around us. We were supposed to go back to the apartment to change before the church ceremony but were instead stuck in a near standstill on the road, making our guests wait on us again.
Then we got a call from Steve's parents. His father was having a medical issue. A district president who had just pulled off a district conference the weekend before our wedding, my father in law is also diabetic and likely hadn't eaten much all day, with him and my mother in law in the driver's seat on everything to do with our wedding. The call was suddenly all too easy to make: cancel the church ceremony.
Equal parts disappointment and relief flooded through me. I was sad my parents would not get to walk me down the aisle, that the beautiful flower arch my in-laws had purchased would go unused, that the part that most closely resembled what I recognized as a wedding and had the most of my own personal touches on it would be eliminated. But I was also so relieved that Steve's dad was going to be okay; that no matter what, we were really and truly married; that we had one less thing to stress about.
Honestly, at that point, I would have been totally happy to call it a day then and there.
Cancel the reception, too, I thought for a moment. Let the guests eat as much as they want, and the rest of us can all go home and just sleep off the stress of this day.
But much like the proverbial show, the party must go on, and go on it did.
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