All dressed up

I have this black dress that has hung in the closet for years.

Can’t remember the last time I wore it. And I was almost afraid to try it on because I was sure it would fit a little, uh, differently.

Because you know dresses, especially little black ones, shrink over the years. That’s just what they do. Do too!

Well, my 5-year-old daughter pulled out the antique remnant (I figure I can call anything pre-kids antique because of the aging I’ve done since having them).

And perhaps because she’s tired of seeing me wear the same old T-shirts and jeans (at least on days when I shower), she wanted me to slip it on.

It happened to be a rare night when her father and I were actually going out, not just outside, out of the house. I know, crazy, huh?

It was more of a casual outing to a movie so I slipped (more like tugged and yanked) the dress on for her, did a little spin, then took it off.

She carried that dress around with her asking me to wear it. I told her it was for a special occasion, that I’d wear it again another day.

Tears filled her eyes as she hung tightly to that dress.

When we came home, she was sleeping, but still clutching that dress as if it were a treasured blanky.

“I should have just worn the dress,” I thought.

Eventually, she stopped talking about the dress. Until the day of our 10-year wedding anniversary.

“You’re going to wear it, right?” she asked me before school.

I’ve never been much of a dress-wearer, so I honestly didn’t feel like it. My husband and I hadn’t planned anything elaborate, just an early dinner, maybe a movie.

A day out. Without kids. That in itself, for me, was reason enough to celebrate.

That and the fact that in 10 years of marriage, we’ve survived fertility treatments involving more time in stirrups than I care to talk about.

Not to mention those pregnancies I spent bent over a toilet blaming my husband for everything from the smell of his cologne to global warming.