A Veiled Attempt At Civility

Today is the story of Milliner Man. Or rather, its not so much a story as a comment on some of the people out there who’s sphincters are so tight that it doesn’t seem that they will ever remove the pole that has been (inconveniently) wedged where the sun doesn’t shine! There are unfortunately a lot of them out there. This particular individual however also has the misfortune of being extremely narrow minded. If he has any friends I hope they warn him that he’d best be careful not to let his head ever slip through the eye of a needle while he’s working. If his concentration were to lapse one day, all it would take is a turn of the head and he’d choke himself quite fatally I'm sure.

Thats probably a little unfair actually. Especially as I’ve not actually had the misfortune of meeting this man. I’m sure if you fit into his preconceived notions of the way the world should run then he could be quite accommodating and pleasant. The Boy however has had a couple of conversations with him to date and was definitely not impressed. And therefore, by proxy, I wasn’t all that impressed either.

It all started a while ago when I realised that I was going to have to rethink the veil decision. When we bought the dress, we decided on a cathedral length veil. Thats one that goes beyond the length of the dress and brushes the floor. I tried on an ivory one which just looked dirty against the non-ivoryness of the dress and so we arranged for the veil to be dyed the colour of the dress. All good. When I later considered the fact that I planned to wear an ivory jacket that was clearly not the same colour as the dress over the dress, it occurred to me that I was then going to have exactly the same problem with the veil but for the opposite reason.

There are several possible solutions to this dilemma but to cut a long story short, I saw a picture of a birdcage net veil (a piece of netting that only covers part or all of the face – why not go from one extreme to the other?) and thought that might be the way to go. Of course, the particular netting that I had my eye on is practically impossible to find and when people actually figure out what you’re talking about then the generic response seems to be “I can’t help you, but good luck”. And this was apparently the response that Milliner Man ended up giving but it took some patronising words and un-cooperation to get there first.

The Boy, being the brilliant and wonderful man that he is, has been trying to source the type of netting to which I took a fancy. He has looked at accessory distributors, fabric wholesalers and also artisans that might use said netting. Thus the millinery connection. He looked at the speaker list for a millinery conference to identify who was going to be the more high end purveyor of headwear and came up with a guy near the City and one in the Eastern Suburbs. The one in the Eastern Suburbs told The Boy he wasn’t going to sell him anything because he was saving everything for his brides. Whatever thats supposed to mean. So The Boy rang the other gentleman to enquire as to whether he might be able to assist us in our search. My fiancée was subsequently advised that perhaps he should just get his fiancée to phone up and make a time to come in instead. According to The Boy, this guy may as well have said ‘does your Mummy know that you’re making this phone call’ because he obviously didn’t want to give anyone but the Bride the time of day. When the conversation progressed a bit, it was also conveyed that a ‘cheaper’ option would be to go to another shop which he really felt we’d be better off doing. Well I think that people are often better off not cutting off their nose to spite their face but there you go. What does he think I am? Some two-bit slapper who decided that maybe K-Mart wasn’t the only place I should look for my bridal attire?

Anyway after that terribly auspicious beginning, you’d think that we’d just give the guy the flick. And I’m sure The Boy would have if it wasn’t for the fact that this particular sort of netting has proven extremely difficult to find. The Boy therefore decided to give it another go and make a time to go to the shop in person. Whilst phoning up to make the arrangement however, Milliner Man told The Boy that he had gotten very lucky in his choice of bride if I was the one hard at work while The Boy was swanning off to look at items for the wedding. Which kind of conveyed the attitude that I was no longer thought of as the ‘Mummy’ to approve of what my fiancée was doing when I wasn’t there but the ‘Sugar Mummy’ to send my pet out on an errand. Needless to say, The Boy was a little pissed by this. As far as he’s concerned, yes, he did actually score in his choice of partner although in regards to our wedding, for the fact that I trust his judgement and taste implicitly. As far as I’m concerned, I actually scored too because I have someone who likes doing all this stuff (when he’s not dealing with arrogant individuals) and is good at it.

So we have hit a few stumbling blocks on the road to wedded bliss. Some people seem to find it very hard to understand why The Boy is involved with the wedding planning at all and assume he couldn’t possibly have permission to handle all the details of the day. The fact that he is a pleasant, well spoken individual who is more often than not, more knowledgeable on most wedding issues than I often am apparently makes no difference whatsoever. Oh well, we shall persevere. I still haven’t managed to find what we were looking for or settle on another solution to the problem but I’m sure it’ll get figured out. Eventually. And with a little bit of sarcasm.