It’s supposed to be the happiest day of your life. You’re supposed to wear the most flattering white dress you’ve ever worn. You are supposed to glow like you got the best sleep you ever had the night before. It must be partly because of these great expectations that many girls either wait impatiently for this day or sometimes even curate it like a theater play.

Imagine a day, where you wake up expecting that nothing should go wrong. As the stage is set, weeks and months of planning come to a climax. Camera men mount shiny shoes on top of boxes. Cinderella ball gowns swing on trees, net stands or wardrobes. Matching gold or diamond rings are set up on leaves. Somewhere at another location, the groom and his best man pump fists and at the bride’s home, or better, in a hotel room, the blushing bride opens and closes her eyelashes in dramatic slow motion as she turns towards the bejeweled bouquet in her hands.

The day begins, staggering under the pressure of its enormous yoke- The best day of your life.

It is a culmination, an ending, a beginning. But that we would have such a fixture on how solemnly, we placed an earring on our left ear, using our right hand, while peering outside a window, is a little misleading. We miss most of the funny or beautiful moments that are not on script – like the squeals and cheers of the air hostesses you meet at the door of your picture venue as you dash inside, gown lifted high, panting because you are late, like your cousin holding up your dress for you to use the bathroom because your underskirt is too puffy and it can barely fit into the toilet room, like the morning ceremony where your parents bless you, place a lesu over your head and sing you songs of farewell as they lead you outside the door as was done for women in generations before.

I wrote a blog post about a month after my wedding, talking about things that went wrong on my day, in a sort of advisory form to ‘the future ones’, with some regret that I could not go back and re-choose anything or re-do anything. Even though I had approached the day with so much gratefulness and appreciation for life, I eventually I found myself questioning whether indeed, it had been the most perfect day of my life.

The internalised pressure to present a picture of perfection and holding down a 300 plus gathering for a young couple which is just starting out, in order to impress family, friends, colleagues and naysayers is a great one.

Perhaps, if we made room for imperfection, if we created moments to connect with our spouses- to actually speak and lock eyes when the camera is not flashing, we would protect the essence of the day. We would also be left with less need to ‘succeed’ at our weddings and a little more happiness, well wishing and celebration so that when we wake up the next day with ringing in our ears wondering what the hell happened the night before, we can look back with happiness and smile.