Reception after the fact is OK

Dear Miss Manners: Our wedding got canceled, but we got married anyway at city hall. My husband and I plan on having the reception next year.

I do very much want to have the father-daughter dance and a chance to wear my wedding dress. We are not asking for gifts, just for family and friends to attend. We have gotten some pushback; people are saying it will be “fake” and that it is tacky for me to wear my dress after I will have been married for a year.

We could have just rescheduled the wedding, but we needed to get married for health care since my husband has an illness and lost his job. This criticism is very hurtful. I didn’t get to have my father walk me down the aisle, and I want to dance with him. Are we out of line?

Gentle reader: Consider how this is perceived in regard to costume jewelry: It is only “fake” if it is pretending to be what it is not. But it can be lovely in itself if it is frankly what it is.

To pretend that you are actually getting married would not only be asking your guests to participate in a charade, it would also undercut the seriousness of the vows you actually took — as if they didn’t count unless accompanied by the hoopla.

Yet Miss Manners — and, she is guessing, people who care about you — could be touched by your sentimentality if it is frankly stated. You cannot squeeze this into formal invitations, so when the time comes write a letter to explain the delayed reception to which you are inviting people.

It would be something like, “Having been unable to celebrate our wedding with you last summer, Oliver and I request the pleasure of your company now that it is possible to gather safely at a reception. We hope you will indulge our desire to enjoy some of the wedding customs we missed.”

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