It’s Raining on Prom Night (1) in Open Diary 2001-2018 (Pre-Prosebox)

Could it be that there’s a reason for my hopeless singledom? Could it be that some powerful force out there is just making sure that I experience everything that I possibly can? Or everything that I may have missed out on earlier? Could it be that, although seemingly very skewed, the stars are actually aligned somewhat in my favor and I just don’t recognize it? Am I supposed to be learning lessons from this?

Let’s take a life experience like Senior Prom in high school, for example. Although I’ve always considered things like prom exceedingly overrated, you can’t deny it’s something of a rite of passage for most American teenagers. Right?

Flashback. It’s the spring of 1986. Robert Palmer was Addicted to Love, and my school was all aflutter with spring fever. Even though I had a tremendous geek factor, I somehow found myself in a close friendship with Janine, one of the coolest girls at school.

Janine was a tall, soft-spoken blonde bombshell with big blue eyes and large, perfectly-shaped breasts and luscious, rounded hips, and every guy in school on a string. I can’t even remember how our friendship came to be. I just remember her pretending to take offense at every stupid joke I told or any f-bomb that escaped my lips (and where along the line did I learn to cuss like a sailor?). We’d sit in the back of the classroom and I’d compete with all the boys for her attention. And I’d always win. Whoa. Can you say girl crush?

After a fallout with my then-best friend and locker mate, Mel, it was Janine who invited me to “move into” her locker with her in the much cooler hallway. That’s when my social status took a leap and never looked back, and suddenly I was smack dab in the middle of all the action!

Janine had a sweet little red MG, and would drive me all over town—top down, music blasting, the two of us singing and laughing. We lived in a little college town, and Jeannine was so above the guys at our high school. Somehow, she could sweet talk her way into bars. With me in tow, of course. Once inside, I’d stand there with my mouth wide open as if to say, “Wooooowwww. I can’t believe we got in here!!!” And she knew fraternity guys, and was always invited to parties at secret locations. And we always figured out ways to sneak our way into and out of trouble. Y’know…stuff like telling our parents that we were going to spend the night at each others’ houses, and then stay out all night!!

One night, Janine took me to a party. It was hosted by a guy who went to a rival high school, and I think his parents were out of town or something. He lived waaaay out in a thick wooded area outside of town on a ranch or something. Well, what I really remember are the woods and the horses. And Paul, the host. Oh Paul. Tall, skinny Paul. Paul, the brilliant classical guitarist. Paul the mathematical genius. Paul the strange. Paul and I hit it off from the get go. Paul and I snuck away from the party to feed apples to the horses and sit under the thick brush when it started to sprinkle. It was there in the tangled, leafy green, hiding, damp, giggling, with our steamy beer breath, we shared our first kiss.

Smitten was I. Janine drove me home, the whole way telling me what an incredibly interesting couple we made! Interesting. I don’t know if I’d ever been considered “interesting” before. Wow.

Paul and I talked daily and for hours on the phone. Sometimes I’d tell him all about my day. All about my life. All about my dreams. Sometimes I’d just sit quietly and listen to him strum his guitar. Sometimes I’d listen to him rant and rave or plot complex schemes of manipulation and strange brilliance that I’d never fathomed. Paul was truly a genius. But one of those bizarre geniuses. You know. The kind that have so much going on upstairs that they don’t know quite what to do with it. And I was fascinated by him. But I couldn’t quite comprehend him.

So what better thing to do than to ask him to my prom? And he said yes. Or something to that effect. At least I thought I heard him agree.

I couldn’t wait to tell Janine. I think she found it more humorous than anything (she referred to Paul as “Crazy Paul”), but she was excited because she saw how thrilled I was. And. My dress was going to be something really special. Because I was going to have such an interesting date, I wanted to make sure the whole night was interesting. Including my dress. I decided to make myself a one-of-a-kind original a la Molly Ringwald in Pretty in Pink.

So I set out on the search for the coolest fabric. Already had the dress itself in mind. Off the shoulder with a fitted bodice and a fairly full skirt. Found a beautiful black brocade (in a paisley pattern, of course), and off I went!

Meantime, Paul and I were still seeing each other, just not as frequently. It was hard because he went to a rival high school, so we didn’t get those special little rendezvous in between classes like we probably would have if we went to the same school. He’d take me out every so often in his old, black VW Beetle he lovingly called the Trashmobile…Black Flag blaring from the speakers. His plots and schemes became more and more bizarre, and I felt like I was starting to misunderstand.

I guess in the end I really did misunderstand because by the time the prom started to get closer, we weren’t talking a lot on the phone, and I was afraid to push him about plans. He’d been pretty vague about the whole prom deal, and I knew that he wasn’t really excited about it. After all, it was Crazy Paul we’re talking about here. Crazy Paul, who’d rather spend his time composing music or rigging the Trashmobile with the latest in electronic technology or plotting ways to torture his teachers and fellow classmates. Why did I view him with such awe?

Finally, around the time when I’d just about finished the dress, I felt the need to ask him about plans, a tux, and all the details that really had to be worked out beforehand. I was talking with him on the phone about this and that, and ever so gently worked my way to the prom details.

Paul: Um, now when is it again?

GS: [date]

Paul: Um…un….uhhh…I’m supposed to go to the Ozzy show that night.

GS: oh.

Paul: Sorry. Guess I got the dates mixed up or something. Heh.

GS: Oh. Um. That’s okay. I guess.

And that was fucking IT!!! I didn’t give him any shit about it or anything!! In fact, I was soooo damn timid about the whole thing that I just kind of blew it off. Everything!! The plans, the dress, the works!

I threw the unfinished dress away.

And I lost touch with Crazy Paul (until my sophomore year in college, but that’s another story). Why oh why couldn’t I have gone for someone “normal”? Someone from my own high school? A football player? One of Janine’s friends? Someone on the debate team? Chess team? Journalism? A band geek?? Anyone?

I did get asked by a couple of guys at school earlier, but by the time I realized that Paul wasn’t going to be my date, it was too late to go back! They’d already found other dates.

I guess I’ve always chosen the path of most resistance. And I think it’s all wrong if it comes too easily….

(To be continued)