Wedding garb a little too transparent (04/04/07)

My barong tagalog has arrived.

But after I tried it on, I wondered whether I could ever wear the thing in public.

Let me explain, or try to.

Our daughter Emily is getting married on June 30. (Thank you. Yes, she's the first of our three.)

It's going to be a beautiful wedding, but it's also safe to say that it's going to be unique.

Emily and her fiancé Mike Veloso have chosen a kind of a retreat center in western Massachusetts for the ceremony. The best man will be a woman. And the officiant will be a friend of the couple; she's studying to be a rabbi.

So, yeah, I guess you could say it's gonna be anything but ordinary.

Emily's bridal gown, which is being made for her by one of her costuming colleagues from her time in Boston-area theater, will be blue. Her bridesmaids will be her sisters, Maggie in an emerald-colored gown and Sally in a ruby-colored gown.

So far, so good, even if it is outside the box a bit.

Mike's parents, Manuel and Emilita, were born in The Philippines but emigrated to the U.S. to work as physicians. Emilita has retired from her practice, but Manny still practices on Long Island.

Somewhere along the way during the wedding planning process, Manny and I started to wonder what the heck we should wear to the occasion.

Keeping in mind that the father of the bride and father of the groom are virtual spear-carriers at an event like this, we still want to be comfortable while still being dressed appropriately for the big day.

Tuxedos look great, but they don't meet the comfort rule. And they are far too formal, we thought, for what is supposed to be an outdoor ceremony.

Business suits? Too boring.

A sport jacket and slacks? That fits the comfort rule but seems a little informal.

Finally I got word through Mike that Manny would really prefer to wear the traditional garb for a wedding in The Philippines, something called a barong tagalog.

The idea sounded great to me, and if Manny was going to wear one I figured I should too.

What better way to honor the groom's family heritage than for me to join Manny in a barong tagalog of my own.

Fortunately, he immediately agreed. In fact, he quickly e-mailed back that he needed my measurements so he could have a barong tagalog custom-made for me in The Philippines.

It arrived Saturday, and it is spectacular.

A creamy color, it's an embroidered shirt meant to be worn with no tie and without being tucked in. (Comfort rules!)

I unpacked it as fast as I could and tried it on. It fit perfectly.

There was just one little problem.

It's virtually transparent.

I put it on, looked at myself in the mirror, and cracked up.

There was no way I was taking this aging body of a 58-year-old Midwesterner on display at my daughter's wedding.

Would the officiant be able to remember her lines with me standing there in all my pinkness? Would the people behind me be counting the hairs on my back? How could I expect people to eat at the reception when I was walking around as the poster boy for unappetizing?

Obviously, a phone call was in order.

And I quickly learned that a white T-shirt is standard equipment when wearing a high-quality, wedding-ready barong tagalog.

I can't tell you how relieved I was to hear that.

I'm sure the wedding guests were relieved as well.[[In-content Ad]]