Coming Apart at the Seams
A dress, a church pew, and my own undoing.
It doesn’t feel like long ago that I was wrestling a toddler on this church pew, my daughter’s hand grabbing at the stretchy fabric of the same black dress I wear today, though now the only wrestling I’m doing is internal.
Inside me still lives the little girl who railed against wearing a dress like this one each week to church. The same little girl who gave in and wore the dress after a long fight, because my mom said I had to, and I was a powerless child.
Now, I’m in my thirties, and this plain dress with its empire waist and faux-wrap bust is as close to something that feels like me as my community will allow — as close as my mom’s voice, still echoing through my head, will allow.
You have to show respect for Heavenly Father, and you are a girl, so that means wearing a dress.
This dress isn’t frilly or ruffled. If I absolutely had to wear a dress, there was no way it was going to be frilly, and as an adult it’s no different.
Maybe this dress stuck with me so long because no matter how much weight I gained or lost, no matter how the shape of my body changed, it always seemed to fit and flatter my body, creating the illusion that I was the kind of woman the god of my people demanded I be.
Unlike the dress, the church hasn’t stretched with me. As I have grown into the comfort of accepting myself, accepting that the world might be bigger and more diverse than I thought, into believing maybe everyone deserved to be seen and loved and known exactly as they are, the church hasn’t grown with me.
Now, sitting in the pew, I am not sure I believe what is being said. Or sung.
I stand all amazed at the love Jesus offers me.
Am I really so unlovable that to love me is awe inspiring?
Oh it is wonderful that he should care for me enough to die for me.
Did he die for me? Or did he just die?
I shift in my seat, filled with an unfamiliar discomfort at the thought of a god whose acceptance of me is conditional on some other person’s death, a god who insists I need saving.
I am already good. I was always good. I don’t need saving. My voice wants to sing the words over the top of the congregation.
My heart swells in counterpoint to the music. The dress is fully intact, but sitting here in the chapel, all the seams have come undone. An undoing years in the making, plucking a stitch at a time until a single pull in just the right spot makes the whole thing fall to pieces.
It’s been three years since I wore a dress or sat in a church pew.
I went to a friend’s wedding this summer; I wore linen pants and breezy button-down shirt. I felt more accepted there than I ever felt in church. I think I was almost as happy as the grooms.
