Dances with Wolves

YO!  I'm here!  Sorry to leave you hanging again.  I seem to go in spurts with the posts.  My apologies.  I get side tracked.  By life.  And as I'm actually living my life, rather than blogging about it, I see funny things along the way and think, "I'm going to blog about that!"  and then I contrive a story in my head and it's funny as hell and I know y'all will be entertained.  And then life keeps going and I keep getting in the midst of it all (life and living) and when I find the time to actually sit and write, I forget all the stories I was going to tell you.  None of it seems that entertaining anymore. 

This week has been filled with drama.  It's homecoming week.  The brunette actually has a male date for the dance.  Her first.  (male date that I'm aware of, not dance).  I'm familiar with the bloke as he's been here before and I've seen him at other people's houses.  He's a nice kid.  Race car driver.  I try to make that into a positive thing - ya know - he knows how to handle a car at 114 mph, surely he can transport my daughter safely around at 40 mph.  And he's been driving since he was 2.  And now he's 16 (or maybe 17) - so he's got tons of driving experience.  Right?  (Just nod your head so I'll feel better please and thank you.)

Well, some smart ass 15 year old gets the brilliant idea to have 10 girls out to her house to get ready for the dance.  And then ALL of the boys can retrieve their dates from that house and ALL of the parents can come out there to take pictures.  HUH?  No.  The boy can retrieve you from YOUR house. That's the way it works.  And besides that, it's asinine to have that many girls getting ready at one house.  I don't give a shit how huge the house is.  And I should likely call the mother and cuss her out.  Well, because I like to win battles and knew I was going to lose this one due to the fact that I was the only person on my side, I quickly rallied my troup and called for back up.  Fortunately my troup was feeling the same way I was so we devised a different plan for our two girls.  A compromise, if you will.  And we delivered it - amazed at our brilliance and touting our leniency and flexibility... and.....

we got tears.  door slamming.  book throwing.  hateful tones.  But we got on our cell phones and texted until our fingers bled and our eyes went crossed and gave each other strength and in the end - we had stood our ground and the forces of two became greater than the forces of 10 and we won.  It's homecoming.  It's their sophomore year.  It's not freakin' prom (which by the way has the pomp and circumstance which is 12 times greater than all my weddings combined).  I'm not driving around for 2 hours to get a damned picture of the brunette on her way to a dance that will last all of 90 minutes if that.  I paid $100 for the dress and accessories (they don't yet wear shoes to these dances or that bill would be higher yet), I want a picture of her in it.  Without having to clamor over 30 other parents to get it.  Without having to park in the back 40 and walk 5 miles to get it.  And I want to be able to give that boy "the look" without him being distracted by 10 other pretty girls in short dresses while I give it. 

That's all I want.  The brunette accused me of making a big deal out of it.  Seriously?  I'm not the one who wants to travel the earth and back with 10 friends to put on some make-up and a pretty dress and go to a dance.  She told me the whole point was to get ready together.  Really?  I thought the whole point was to go to the damned dance.  That's why I forked over the money for a dress.  If I'd known the whole point  was to play dress up with friends all night, I'd have just offered to have a slumber party, purchased 180 pizza rolls at Sams and been done with it.  Who knew. 

In my day we didn't travel in packs (at least I didn't).  If we had a date for a dance, we got ready at our respective homes and our dates retrieved us.  Our parents took the one obligatory picture in front of the fire place and we left to meet our friends.  I don't even think my parents knew who my friends were and they certainly never met any of the other parents. (oh and we NEVER wore pretty short dresses to Homecoming - we wore WOOL SUITS).

I don't necessarily agree with the olden day approach, and prefer that my kids allow me to be involved in their lives and even feel special when they want me to meet their friends' parents and socialize with them.  It's like a message of "hey!  you're pretty cool!  meet the fockers!"  But there are just some times when I don't feel all the extravagance is necessary and they're getting ahead of themselves.  This was one of those times.  And I will forever be hated for it....  Until the brunette has a 15 year old daughter of her own- and then she will likely question my judgment for even letting her GO to this dance with a boy.  And I will become that mother - the one who didn't even give a shit enough to know that it was a bad idea to begin with.