The day after Christmas I vowed to never again eat four courses of caviar, goose, Christmas pudding and Stilton cheese within a few hours. And yet, it was too late. For the following week there was a family wedding in England, which is something like a college reunion: one always hopes to look one's best.
The beautiful wedding was to be in the New Forest district in Hampshire, southwest of London. I packed my best black dress, which is corseted and fit me perfectly, or at least, it did when I last wore it two years ago. The wedding reception was going to be held in a "Burlesque tent" shipped in from Budapest. I wasn't exactly sure what that was, but felt that the black corseted theme of my dress would be a good fit with the setting.
Wild ponies are common in the New Forest district of Hampshire.
An hour before the ceremony, I stepped into the dress, but the zipper up my back seemed to be stuck! I asked my 21-year-old daughter to help.
"Mom, she said, it doesn't fit.
"What? Of course it does! Try harder!" I had nothing else to wear. I brought this dress at great expense four years ago, and justified its price by telling myself that it would be my "black-tie dress" that would carry me through my 40s for the next 10 years. I had outgrown my evening gown from my 30s and was happy to move in to something as beautiful but more sophisticated and age appropriate."
Spanx!" my 19-year-old daughter suggested, and appeared with a pair of what looked like a modern, lightweight version of my mother's girdle with stockings attached. This proved to be an excellent idea. I pulled and stretched and squished and squeezed into this exceedingly tight garment, commenting that no man or lover should ever see his or her partner execute the donning of these torturous body shapers. It took a while, but eventually every inch of my body from my hips to my breasts was squashed first in to the exceedingly tight Spanx, then the even tighter corset of the dress.
"You look magnificent!"
"Thank you." I replied, hardly able to breathe, realizing I would certainly have to bypass dinner.
I sat painfully upright through the beautiful candlelit ceremony, remembering something I'd read years ago in a magazine : After the age of 30, women gain a pound a year. I wished I had taken heed to this information and planned accordingly. I had managed an accurate estimate for the lifespan of my 30s dress. But having outgrown its successor in only four years into my 40s was depressing. Three glasses of Champagne and a good glass of white Burgundy dulled the pain of the corset; I completely forgot about the device restraining my bulging trunk.
After the service, guests filed into the huge Burlesque tent for dinner. The guests were awed at this stunning room, with wooden floors; vibrant, colorful fabrics; and wooden tent poles carved with small, chubby, smiling naked people in the most extraordinary acts of Kama Sutra.
Dinner was a feast. I greedily tucked into the smoked ham hock terrine, served in individual flip-top mason jars, with crispy lettuce and toast points. That was followed by roast chicken breast stuffed with truffles tucked underneath the crispy skin on a mountain of creamy mashed potatoes. Delicious wine flowed. I ventured without a thought on to the frozen berries floating in hot white chocolate sauce.
After dinner, the tent was abuzz with excitement. Wedding guests began to move to the dance hall. As I stood up to follow, I realized to my horror, that I could no longer move. I had stretched the Spanx to its absolute limit.
I waddled off to the ladies room – resenting the beautiful thin girls in their 20s I passed, giggling in their comfortable, flowing dresses. I closed the door to my stall and with great ambition, pulled off the Spanx in an act about as unglamorous and unsightly as getting them on. I reached under the corset and pulled as hard as I could to squeeze the elastic fabric out of the corset, which I knew once unzipped would never be zipped up again. The dress' built-in corset held and I was back in the game. I threw the Spanx in the trash and trotted back to the party.
It was not until I was on the dance floor, that I remembered -- to my horror -- that my dress was designed with a split up the front that ended about two inches from the top of my bare legs and beyond. I had never worn the dress without underwear and tights, but now, without my all-in-one Spanx, I was bare from my shoes up!
The author leads the conga line, sans Spanx.
As the evening progressed, I wisely declined the delicious chocolate wedding cake and switched to Champagne, which must have given me the courage to lead the conga line without one paranoid glimpse toward the split skirt of my dress.
And so the question I ask myself is this: Am I resolved to fighting this disagreeable pound-per-year from now to eternity? Even from now until my 50s dress? Will I forever view delicious foods and wines as a sin to be punished by the donning of Spanx?
No. I shall just buy a new dress.
Lucy Dahl is an author and screenwriter in Los Angeles. Her other articles about food, memory and family can be found here.
Photos: Zipper, at top, iStockphoto; ponies and the author dancing, courtesy of Lucy Dahl.
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