Holly Ball

My daughter and her date.
Yes, she's taller.
Bless his heart.

Saturday was a busy day if you were a parent of teens in Mathews County. I happen to be the parent of two teens, so I was doubly stressed busy.

First there was the Christmas parade. I'll show those pictures later in the week.

Then there was the Holly Ball, which is a formal high school dance that wasn't invented when I went to Mathews High School back in the late '70s and early '80s.

Among other things that weren't invented yet were computers, cell phones, I-things, internet, fruit roll ups, reality TV shows, cable TV, and indoor plumbing electricity.

After all the requisite fuss and ado to prepare for this outing, Son took off in one direction to pick up his date (who is from Essex), and Daughter and I went to a friend's pre-dance gathering.

With the exception of the first girl on the left, these young ladies
have been together since preschool, which was only yesterday. 
Now look at them.  (Sniff.)

They're growing up too so fast.

Did I mention my daughter had a DATE? 
(He is adorable and very nice. He texted her several times
the day after the dance to let her know 
he had a good time.  Bless his heart.)

I still cannot believe this is happening.
Young adults emerging right before
 my bloodshot  eyes.

After sending Daughter off with her date to the dance, I scurried home to meet Son, his date, and another couple who was with them.

Son's date was gorgeous.  And all smiles.

O.M.G.  
I know I'm the mother and more than 
slightly biased, but are these two beautiful or what?

After they left for the dance, I hung out with two other mothers who successfully distracted me from all the worrying and fretting I would have done if I were home alone.

I am thrilled to announce that we all survived the 2012 Mathews High School Holly Ball.

Amen.

First Dance

-from the public landing, Onemo

Aside from not knowing how to dance, what I remember most about my first high school dance was the fact that I wore my mother's dress.

It was a blue polyester number that clung to my panty hose in all the wrong places. I had to wear one of her dresses because in the 9th grade my fashion style was more "tomboy meets burlap sack." I'd sooner wear bib overalls than put on a dress, which worked out well since we never went anywhere that would require a dress. Until that first dance.

Whether my mother knew it or not, an older guy had asked me to that dance. (She drove me there, dropped me off and picked me up afterwards; I just met him there. It was all very innocent except for the age difference.)

Steve was the much older brother of a classmate of mine. As a matter of fact, he was so old he was drawing social security was no longer in high school.

This whole quasi- date thing was nerve wracking enough, but when he asked me to actually dance that night, the flood gates of my sweat glands broke loose. Why couldn't we just linger on the sidelines and watch everyone else? Wasn't it good enough just to stand there and talk? Why dance? Why? Am I the only one who sees how ridiculous everyone looks? Just look at them! This is sillier than a Benny Hill episode, they're flailing around out there in fast forward mode, like they're in the midst of a seizure or something. Surely these people can't be serious.

But now here I was, sweating, wearing my mother's blue polyester dress which was in a full-out, static-cling war with my panty hose, and I was supposed to walk in these ridiculous high heels out into the middle of that dance floor, among all those silly looking people and dance? With Steve, who probably hadn't been inside a high school auditorium for seventeen seven years?

Thanks to post traumatic stress syndrome a survival mechanism known as fainting which blocks out bad memories, I do not recall anything else about that first dance, but I do know that I didn't see Steve more than once or twice after that. I blame the polyester dress and the static cling. The profuse sweating, the deer in the headlights look, and whatever feeble attempts at dancing I made while fending off a stroke panic attack surely had nothing to do with it.

Now, fast forward to this century today, when Chesapeake Bay Son has not only attended some school-sanctioned dances before entering high school, but he won a contest in sixth or seventh grade. In sixth or seventh grade. I think I was watching the Mickey Mouse Club reruns after school in sixth grade, how is it possible that he knew enough about dancing to win a contest? Dancing was on my television screen not my radar screen.

(Lawrence Welk, anyone? My grandmother forced us to watch it. This may explain a whole lot, including my fear of singing, dresses, saxophones, clarinets, side burns, leisure suits and Dippity Do hair dos.)

To this day dancing is not something I enjoy unless it's at Blog Fest, and then of course the wine breaks down those walls of inhibition, and I attribute my deep-rooted fear to that first foray into the dance scene in high school. And also that polyester dress.

Now it's your turn. Feel free to tell us about your first dance or just fill in the blanks below:

Aside from _____________, what I remember most about my first school dance is ____________.

The Date

This is a shot of the second floor of the Islander motel, where the bar and dance floor lounge used to be. There are many stories to tell about this lounge, the site of countless happy social gatherings in my late teens and early twenties.

But today the pressing topic on my mind is dating, specifically does anyone date any more?

Although it's come as quite a shock to me, it appears I am the mother of a teenager who is ready to go to the Islander lounge parties and social functions and such things, when only yesterday I accidentally dropped him out of his baby carrier right onto the kitchen floor was giving him baths in the kitchen sink.

Don't get me wrong. Dating is not on his radar screen yet, at least not overtly. But already I sense a major shift forthcoming, sort of like the tectonic plates in California.

Here lately I've come to realize that teenagers nowadays do less dating and more "mass gathering, " i.e. boys and girls going to someone's house to do God knows what hang out, listen to music, or do God knows what lollygag around a bonfire. Or they go as a group to a movie, for example.

This never happened when I was growing up. Never. Other than my high school graduation party down Port Haywood, I do not recall any mass gatherings that would have been sanctioned and even chaperoned by parents, unless you want to count that one time my mother let us have a party for the girls' basketball team post season the dances at school or the skating rink in Gloucester, both very rich and flavorful topics for another time.

From a parental standpoint, there are many benefits to this newfangled group approach, including the knowledge that the kids are in one central location under adult supervision (in theory), as opposed to gallivanting up and down the road in cars going to nowhere in particular doing God knows what which is what we did.

Chesapeake Bay Son went to a high school party of sorts last night and has recently announced that he'd like to have a going away party for a friend of his next weekend, and a birthday gathering the following weekend-- a gathering that will consist of two girls and two boys. Ahem.

I, of course, am very happy to oblige and honored that he wants to have people over rather than wanting to escape somewhere else to do God knows what.

But when I think back to when I was his age, I can't help but make comparisons--and the differences are very shocking. This may be a good thing for him, because most of my early high school stories involve introversion, awkwardness and an utter and complete lack of social skills. Actually that still holds true today.

In the next episode of The Date, I'll talk about my first high school dance and try not to cry. Future episodes, documenting several of my favorite dates of all time, will delve into some of the differences between then and now, up to and including my use of Morse code the rotary telephone vs. Son's use of a so-called smart phone (i.e. a phone that makes me feel dumb).

Mothers of teenagers: Do they go on dates anymore or is it more of this group dynamic? Is the mother supposed to disappear into her room where she can play on the internet all night long or does she need to keep an eagle eye on the God knows what festivities?

Anyone still awake: Did you go to group parties/gatherings as a 9th grader?

Clearly, I have a lot to learn.

Serenity now.