Prom 1998
Preparing for the Unexpected
The 1998 junior prom, “Parkside Cafe,” began without incident at the Bethel Inn’s convention center in Bethel, Maine. Families showed up in large groups to take photos. Lots of couples posed near the large fireplace in the lobby.
Although I wished class officers could have helped me decorate the ballroom more with balloons, they had to leave earlier in the day to get their hair done. What had seemed like a gigantic checklist of responsibilities — printing tickets, finding a gift (scented candles), making sure a table was set up for the disc jockey and gathering balloons held up by a sheet on the ceiling for the drop — began to be completed. We had plenty of chaperones too.
One of them could tell I was nervous. While I wasn’t saying anything after doors opened, I was probably moving about like I was bracing for disaster. He told me things were going okey-dokey.
Class advisors in American high schools have multiple responsibilities. They help students organize social events such as school dances in the gymnasium. They can raise money to help pay for caps and gowns for graduation. And they may run a formal ball for 11th graders, not held in the gym, called a prom.
Veteran class advisors told me proms never make money for a class. They break even.
Proms did create earnings for certain retailers because glossy catalogs crammed my mailbox the year I was junior class advisor at Dirigo High School in Dixfield, Maine. I took to piling them up in the back of my classroom. Girls asked to take a look at them during activity period. I told them to go ahead.
What I didn’t tell many people was that high school proms were a mystery to me. Despite my mother trying to fix me up with a friend’s cousin by saying “She’s lost a lot of weight,” I resisted. I may have informed Mom that it was difficult finding a date when attending an all-male high school.
She cried because I continued to refuse. That was my biggest teen rebellion.
Although I privately referred to prom as “the expensive dance,” I was determined to put on the best one I could. The class officers didn’t talk to each other during part of the school year because of disagreements but came together as the date approached.
Once the music started and teens began to dance, I thought about exhaling with relief. We had no fight or drunken antics, which were my nightmare scenarios.
The disc jockey stepped away from his table to talk with me. A guy wants to propose to his girlfriend, he said.
I hadn’t thought of that.
Of course, I didn’t know what to do. The principal was helping out as a chaperone so I dashed off to him.
The principal talked to the Dirigo student’s date. He looked maybe 19 or 20 years old. The principal bet him $5 he wouldn’t do it.
Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On” was playing when the best friend of the student showed up with a wireless microphone in front of the disc jockey’s table. The Dirigo senior’s date got down on one knee with some sort of ring when the microphone was stuck in their faces. Loud feedback followed.
I suspected she said yes as the girl spent the rest of the evening crying.
A chaperone told me that the most entertaining part of the prom was not the proposal. It was me freaking out. I stood against the wall next to her, watching it all unfold while saying “Oh my God. Oh my God.”
I never found out if the senior girl and her boyfriend ended up getting married. I told everyone that after all the work creating the setting, I or the class officers should have found out. Or been invited to the wedding.
Even though that night had more surprises than I ever would have wanted, I prefer talking about the prom more than anything else in my teaching career. Most proms haven’t had the kind of surprise Dirigo students witnessed. The experience also summed up a lot of teaching work and a lot of life: preparing as much as possible helps, but not with everything. I needed to adapt.