Story 6

A fifties dream

1956. Elvis Presley makes his film debut in “Love me Tender”. Audrey Hepburn shines in “War&Peace”. Grace Kelly gets married to Prince Reinier, a fairytale wedding that made many girls dream …

She had seen him many times at work: the slim blonde young man at work. He had everything she dreamed of: handsome, intelligent and stylish. She had just turned 25, time to settle down and close the doors of the parental home behind her.

She had not exactly had a happy childhood: mother had been widowed early, scarcity and the traumas of the war still clung to her. She would never be happy again. Further education was out of the question; it was too expensive. And mother didn’t see the point, girls would become housewives anyway. And so, after secondary school, she went to work as a telephone operator. Secretly, she dreamed of ha ar prince. Maybe it was him, that young civil servant from the third floor.

He was always on the same train in the morning, boarding a few stops earlier than her. He seemed somewhat introverted. And yet she slowly but surely managed to catch his attention. She often sat near him until he finally noticed her. It became a train romance. He fell for her enthusiastic stories, sometimes spiced with a touch of fantasy. She was a real performer. It was her way of being heard and escaping from her grey existence.

Quite soon, wedding plans followed that were lukewarmly received by his family. He came from the Catholic bourgeoisie, she from a working-class, liberal background. But he chose her. They married between Christmas and New Year, without too much fuss.

She had been thinking about her dress for months. It would not be a typical wedding dress. She wanted something modern, without drag or drama. As a young woman, she was totally captivated by Christian Dior, but also by Hubert de Givenchy’s beautiful cocktail dresses. She devoured French magazines such as Elle and Jours de France. She bought an “Elle Boutique” pattern of an “Afternoon Dress” to which she gave her own interpretation. For the fabric, she chose a beautiful embossed motif. Handy as she was, she sewed her own dream dress.

They lived long, but by no means happy, until death separated them. Whether he was ultimately the dream prince she once envisioned, she left in the dark.

When she moved to an assisted living facility much later, the pattern of her wedding dress still stuck in her wooden, flower-painted sewing box. Her carefully kept wedding dress she donated away, hoping it would find a nice place somewhere.