LA Dennison

For this week's Road Trip Wednesday, the topic is:

PROM

Oh, it's so funny to think back to that time. My school had plenty of semi-formal dances for underclassmen. I'd gone to most of those, sometimes with a boy I was dating and sometimes with friends. During my junior year, I hadn't really thought much about prom, until spring break.

When you grow up in Florida, the spring break tradition begins early. I had been spending spring break in Panama City since middle school (with parental supervision, of course). The only difference about junior year was that my friends and I could all DRIVE. This meant hours of cruising up and down the strip. On our last night there, we met up with some friends from a neighboring city. I'd known most of these guys for a year or so, except one. I distinctly remember asking one of my best friends, "Who is That?" She answered, "Oh, you know him. Everybody knows Charles."

But I'd never met him before. We hit it off immediately, and we talked for the rest of the night as the cruising continued. When it was time to leave, he promised he'd get my phone number from a friend and call me. After a few weeks back home, and a tiny bit of drama, he finally did.

On the night of our first date, I asked him to go to prom with me. (Trust me, for quiet, shy seventeen-year-old Laurie, this was a huge step out there.) He said yes. Then he asked me to go to prom with him. (We lived about 30 minutes away from each other, so we didn't go to the same school.)

Remember in Pretty in Pink, when Blaine says he asked someone else to prom, but forgot when he asked Andi? Well, that happened with my date. He already had a date to his prom when I asked him, and I felt awful later that he broke it off to go with me. We went to his prom with a group of his friends, and we ate at a lovely French restaurant, where I had a salad because I was a vegetarian. We went to mine with a group of my friends, and we ate at the Olive Garden. It was nice to get dressed up, and we had fun, but I don't really remember staying at prom for very long.

Of course I'm glad that we went. We went to my senior prom, too, after he graduated, which was a much smaller affair. But our first prom together is a really nice memory, because my date ended up becoming my husband. This year will be our 14th wedding anniversary.

Music for today: If You Leave, by OMD (In case you couldn't tell by my pink prom dress, I had a serious thing for Pretty in Pink back in the day.)