Senior Prom

This is a story about my senior prom. There is no moral to the story, no takeaways, no insights, no accumulated wisdom, just a funny story. And it’s not even that funny.

So most people know that I have been with my wife since we were 15 years old. When we were in high school, I lived in Connecticut, and she lived in Pennsylvania, so there were sometimes strains on the relationship. Long-distance relationships are hard to keep up when you’re a kid. So we broke up at the beginning of my senior year, and for most of my senior year, I was unattached.

Senior prom was coming around and I had to find a date. It was an odd position to be in, since I usually had a girlfriend. I thought seriously about asking Jessica from my economics class. Jessica was one of the prettiest and most popular girls in school, and I was just a band geek. She was a 5’9” brunette with very early 90s hair, but everyone back then had early 90s hair. We sat next to each other in economics class, which was taught by a crew cut, clipboard basketball coach named Hugh Campbell. Campbell was a popular teacher, and his classes were filled with jocks and cool kids. It was an elective for me, and a fun diversion.

Campbell’s understanding of economics was pretty primitive, in retrospect, but the highlight of the class was the stock market competition we had with other schools in the area. Jessica was my partner in the stock market competition. She didn’t know what the hell she was doing, so she let me pick stocks, and we ended up coming pretty close to winning the competition. Our portfolio was actually up, and if you recall what was going on in 1991-92, it was a pretty challenging environment. Most of the other teams were down. So that was how my Wall Street career was born.

But really I just wanted Jessica to be my prom date. So I spent a few weeks working up the courage to ask her, and when I finally decided to do it, I went into school, and, well, you know how fast word gets around in high school—this guy named Todd had already asked her out. Todd was the school dreamboat, easily the best-looking guy in our class, so I was totally stuck for a date, yet again. I waited too long. I’m not sure she would have said yes in any case—though I was a likable kid who did sports and music and academics, we were from different social circles. Kind of like Pretty In Pink.

At this point most everyone had a date for prom, and I was out of ideas. I went to the mall one afternoon with my mom, and she was puttering around Filene’s, looking for clothes. I think I spent half my childhood bored in department stores while my mom was picking out clothes. But this time I saw what might have been the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. She worked there, and walked right in front of me when I was sitting in a chair feeling sorry for myself. Another 5’9” brunette, now that I think of it. So in true John Cusack Say Anything style, I ran out to the parking lot, got in my car, went to the florist, bought a bouquet of flowers, and brought it back to the store. But she was nowhere to be found. I went to the customer service desk, and she had already left for the day. So I left the flowers there, with my phone number, hoping she would call.

Incredibly, she called the next day. Her name was Lynne, and I asked her to the senior prom on the spot. She suggested that we have a date first, so I was like, great, let’s go to the Gondolier in New London and go out to a movie afterwards. So far, this whole thing is very 1992.

Lynne lived in East Lyme. Now, I didn’t really know my way around East Lyme, but apparently there is a bad section of town in East Lyme. The houses were small and run-down, and the neighborhood was depressed. I pulled up in front of her house, rang the doorbell, and Lynne answered, looking like a model. She brought me inside what was probably a 300 square foot living room, and introduced me to her two brothers, mustachioed, mulleted munchkins with monosyllabic names like Ty and Bo. If you’re trying to picture these guys, they were kind of like a 5-foot-4 combination of Richard Marx and Freddie Mercury. The implication was that they would beat my ass if I tried anything funny with Lynne. Lynne was gorgeous, but I had a sense of impending doom.

At the time, the Gondolier was the nicest restaurant in New London. It’s still there, under new ownership. We had a table with a view and started to unpack why we were both here. So me, 18 years old, a senior in high school, drum major of the marching band, a wrestler, going to the Coast Guard Academy in the fall, and majoring in math. Lynne, 19 years old, did not go to college, working in a department store, and had just broken up with her boyfriend, a cop. Even though there was only a year between us, it was clear that she was an adult and I was a child, and we were going in completely opposite directions. The conversation was not going well, and it was class that was getting between us. Which is funny, because we were both poor as shit, but it was our choices and ambitions that were pushing us apart. Somehow we got on the topic of smoking, and I made some comment about how you’d have to be a complete moron to smoke…and then she told me that she smoked.

We went to the movies in Niantic—I have no recollection of what we saw. All I remember is that I tried to hold her hand at one point in the movie and she pulled it away. Later, I dropped her off at her tiny house, I walked her to the front door, went in for the hug, and she slammed the door in my face.

I wasn’t too broken up about it. Things work out the way they are supposed to work out. But from a practical standpoint, I still needed a date to the senior prom.

The following week I was having lunch at school, outside on the grass, when my classmate Ann sat down next to me with her friend Emily. My high school was pretty big, about 2,000 students, and I thought I knew everyone, but I hadn’t seen Emily before. Later, I asked Ann about her—who is she? Turns out she was a freshman. Emily was startlingly attractive, and though I didn’t know her at all, I asked her to the senior prom on the spot. Turns out Emily was of Mexican descent, and also Jewish, estranged from her father, who was traveling around Mexico playing guitar.

There was nothing terribly eventful about prom. We went out to dinner in New London, again. Emily didn’t say much, being a freshman. Back then they did this thing called Post-Prom Party where you’d go to a gym and stay up all night to keep kids from drinking and getting in trouble. There are a couple of pictures floating around of Emily and me at Post-Prom Party, with her looking like a hostage. Honestly, she wasn’t much fun, but I was pretty wrapped up in hanging around with my classmates. It was hardly a romantic endeavor. I don’t even have any recollection of slow dancing with her.

Like I said, there is no moral to the story. I guess if there was a moral to the story, it would be that I was pretty resourceful for a kid. There was no freaking way that I was going to prom without a date. Anyway, about 18 months later, I reconciled with the girl who was going to be my wife, and the rest is history—we have been married almost 25 years. I have no idea what Jessica, Lynne, and Emily are doing, though I briefly reconnected with Jessica when I was organizing a reunion a few years back. She sent me a Facebook message about something. She didn’t actually friend me, but she sent me a Facebook message.

Just a lot of people who don’t have any answers to anything.

Go fuck yourself,

Jared

Music Recommendation: Khen – Secret Shining. Played this at a gig at Middlebury College six years ago. Monster track. I saw Khen at Treehouse in Miami a few years ago. He was relegated to the small room and was pouting. Kike Roldan was trying to cheer him up by sending models back into the DJ booth.

P.S. We’re Gonna Get Those Bastards will always be free. Feel free to forward to whoever you want.