A Picture of Vanity

As so often it seems when reality and fantasy come face to face, I have to make some choices. I can’t have my cake and eat it too.  We have limited funds for the wedding and must apportion them wisely. Photography has proved particularly troubling. We want to conserve money and keep costs low, but don’t want to sacrifice quality. 

I have a number of friends who are amateur photographers, they have good cameras, take lots of pictures, and take good pictures at that.  I’m sure that they would be willing to capture the day.  But then, I want them to enjoy the wedding, not feel obliged to document it.  And with that I’ve swiftly eliminated the least expensive option since don’t want to make our friends work our wedding.

Simply deciding to hire a photographer, however, has not proved so simple.  While I want to economize, I’m drawn to the most expensive photographers.  Their photos are achingly beautiful.  The weddings look charmed; everyone glows, as if some diaphanous veil of happiness and beauty had settled on the party.  And the brides, they look stunning.  The photos star silky dresses, curls and coiffed hair, bright eyes and brighter lips. 

I look at these pictures and I want them. I want to look that beautiful.  I want to have these pictures so that I can look at them later, when I’m older, when I’m gray and wrinkled, and say to no one or everyone:  “Once I was beautiful, once. See, I was beautiful, once.”

Looking at these beautiful photos has forced me to stare straight at the depth of my own vanity.  I want these pictures not because I want the night to be captured, or so that I have pictures of my family and friends, or even of my future husband, or the two of us on this special day.

I want the nice pictures out of pure vanity. I want to look beautiful and to be captured looking gorgeous.  Up close and personal, it is not a pretty picture. 

The question remains, just how much is my vanity worth? 

- Pen