“What am I going to wear? What am I going to wear?” I started asking myself, Geoff, my mother, my friends and anyone who would listen the day after Geoff and I were engaged in 1978 — eighteen months before our planned wedding date, February 2, 1980. I am not a Disney Princess and did not want to look like one. I am living in London. There is no Kleinfelds. There is no mom, the seamstress, who could whip up a delightful little something on her Singer Sewing machine.

Three weeks before our wedding, I am still dress-less. I have scoured Harrods, Harvey Nichols, Liberty, etc. etc. I have considered a traditional Chinese Qipao Wedding Dress. Nope. I’d have to suck in my stomach all day.

Two weeks before the wedding, still no dress. I’m gung-ho on my beauty prep, and I have a date set at Moulton Brown for my haircut. The day before, I pop into my favorite spa for a facial and exhaust the cosmetician with questions about where to find a wedding dress. Finally, skin gleaming, but panicked over having no dress, I walk to a taxi.

I reach out to grab the door handle. Boom, some guy pushes me out of the way and jumps in the taxi’s backseat and yanks the door shut. I mutter nasty things while I walk to the next waiting taxi. I duck to get in the back, but not far enough. I head-butt the steel door frame and flop onto the cab’s floor groaning. Somehow, while the driver pleads, ​“Don’t throw up in my car,” I manage to give him our address. He drives me home. I ask him to wait while I go in and call Geoff at work to tell him I’m headed to A&E (Accident & Emergency) at our local hospital.

I have a concussion. Treatment: rest and paracetamol for at least a week. Nope. I had a haircut appointment at Moulton Brown on South Moulton Street the next day. And even if I show up at the Barnet Registry Office in a track suit, I want my hair to look great. Morning of my big haircut, I am up, showered and out the door wearing Chelsea boots, black wooly knee socks, a sweatshirt that would have done The Sex Pistols proud and baggy, high-waisted jeans cuffed at the hems. Under this get-up, I sport a bright red bra and knickers (I am living in the UK).

I wince every time my stylist touches my head. When he starts finger-drying my hair (Moulton Brown’s specialty), I grab a hair dryer from his station, turn it on, point it at my head and let it blow. Eyes unfocused, hair standing on end, I apologize, give him a big tip, pay, dress, and hustle Geoff out the salon’s door. 

“Let’s get a cab to Lilywhite’s” (a sporting goods store on Piccadilly and our last stop before driving home), I moan over the tattoo drumming in my head. The traffic crawls. We inch left onto Conduit Street, turn right on Bond Street, then left on Piccadilly and stop in front of Simpsons on Piccadilly. ​“Let us out,” I yelp at the driver. He does. ​“That’s it,” I point to a dress I see in the window and tug Geoff away from the cab as he stuffs his wallet in his pocket. ​“My dress.” We shoot up to the sixth floor. I find a sales assistant. Ask for the dress in the window — a slip dress with an overdress of delicate Austrian embroidered lace with a bow at the waist. Mid-calf. It’s the one. 

“I’ll check to see if we have it in your size,” the sales assistant does a little curtsey and walks off. I can’t breathe. I had not considered the dress might be out of stock. Five minutes later, dress in hand the sales assistant leads me to a dressing room. My lungs fill again. I slip into the dress. A perfect fit. In my Chelsea books and black wooly knee socks, I walk out to the waiting area to show Geoff. The sales assistant and everyone else in the room gasps — and not an ​“Oh, she looks beautiful” gasp. I’m a little indignant until I look in the mirrors on every wall. Everyone is the room has a bird’s eye view of my red bra and knickers. 

“I’ll take it.” I gasp. Slink back into the dressing room. Hand the dress through the curtain to the sales assistant. Change. Meet Geoff with the garment bag at the sales till, go home, and sleep at least ten hours a day until I wake up on February 2, 1980, shower, do my just the right length after a cut two weeks ago hair, apply my makeup, and step into my dress and shoes. They are a size too small. It is January. It is artic in London. There wasn’t a shoe store selling cream colored heels. I bought what I could get. Holding Geoff’s hand, I limp out to our car. I’ll only have to stand for a little while at the registry office. My feet will scream. I don’t care. I have the best dress. I am marrying a wonderful man. I am happy.