Randall: Shopping for a wedding dress — on Black Friday

Who goes shopping for a white dress on Black Friday?

For all her life and half of mine, I've imagined watching my daughter try on a wedding gown. Never once did I picture it taking place in a gridlocked mall on the worst possible shopping day of the year.

But being a mother has taught me you do what you have to do, and you do it when you can.

My daughter — who teaches a combination class of 32 third- and fourth-graders, and barely has time to floss her teeth — is far more organized than I am.

Three months ago, when her fiance knelt on one knee and asked her to be his bride, she whipped a notebook out of her purse and started jotting plans.

Well, first she said "yes." Then she called me and her brothers and her bridesmaids. Then she whipped out the notebook, the first of many to come. She planned her wedding with no help from me, except for a few thousand e-mails and phone calls that we exchanged between her home in California and mine in Las Vegas.

Picking out her wedding dress was one thing we wanted to do together. With four months until the wedding, the clock was ticking. We decided to do it the day before Thanksgiving, while my husband and I were in California for the holiday.

When I was asked to speak that day at a memorial service for a dear friend, my daughter agreed: There are some things more important than a dress — even a wedding dress.

Thanksgiving Day we would be too busy eating to shop. And I was going back to Vegas on Saturday. If we were going to find a dress, it would have to be on Black Friday, the traditional start of the holiday shopping frenzy, a day I usually spend in my pajamas eating leftover turkey and the last piece of pumpkin pie that I hid behind the lettuce in the fridge.

We do what we have to do, I told myself, when we can, even if it has to be on Black Friday.

Friday morning, we left Monterey in a drizzle that became steady rain as we drove 60 miles north to San Jose. Traffic was heavy, but moving.

My daughter had a long list of bridal shops. I prayed we would not need to visit them all.

She made quick work of the first place, grabbed a few dresses, ducked in the dressing room and emerged minutes later, shaking her head.

The second place was busier, but the attendant was helpful and didn't hover. My daughter tried on five or six dresses, but I remember only one.