Prom

I'm still REALLY worn out from Prom last night! We took a party bus, which was more than an hour late and made us push back our reservation and arrive late to the dance. All 21 of us all crammed in and some people danced on the stripper pole (okay...I did too... but it was mostly the boys who did it!) while we rocked out to loud music from Michael Jackson, the Killers, and Queen on our way to dinner at Buster's Grill in Seaport Village, which, by the way, was delicious (I know, cuz I tried just about everyone else's food as well as my own). Then we all piled BACK in the bus for Prom an hour late, and Michael commented that the night felt as if it was over before it had even began.

But we arrived, and it was great. The dance floor was SO cool. There was a disco ball and incredible lights and two projector screens playing music videos which in actuality didn't work all that well. The music wasn't great until the last 45 minutes or so, but they played a block of ALL my favorite dance songs: Every Time We Touch went into Sandstorm which went into the Cha Cha Slide and BACK into Sandstorm, THEN I'm On A Boat, which they censored but people sang anyway. Downstairs was pictures, upstairs was the casino and a balcony, which we frequented for air. My boyfriend wouldn't let me gamble away our $1000 of fake money because he wanted to dance--can you believe it? haha. I expected that it would be air-conditioned well, considering that the dance took place in a nice museum. I was mistaken--it was the most uncomfortable dance I have ever been to. But it was FUN. I got stepped on many times, got several painful bruises from stumbling into a statue, and when I woke up this morning the joints in my legs were aching and my feet were swollen. But it was worth it.

To keep from standing in a really long line, we left the dance floor about 20 mintes early to go get our stuff. It was still a bit of a line, but definitely better than waiting until midnight. We met most of our group, but we still had to wait for people who didn't plan ahead and had to stand in the long line. Everyone was exhausted by the end of the dance. It had been a long night.

We piled into the bus again, and were more crowded than the two times before. Somehow, I ended up crammed in the corner on the floor between Michael's legs and a cooler, which really wasn't all that uncomfortable but severely limited my view of the bus. I could only see 7 other people, and because I was down low, I couldn't see more than the dark sky outside of the window. From my perspective, it looked like we were driving through nothing, like we were the last people on earth, going forward without purpose or direction. The couple sitting next to us had fought, and they both seemed isolated from everyone else, even though they were physically touching. Next to them, a senior without a date stared off into space, with her arm around the only sophomore in our group, who was sleeping on her shoulder. As Michael said, she looked like a mother hen, watching out for her baby. On their other side, another couple slept, with the guy's tuxedo jacket shared between the two of them. It was a strange way to end an amazing night, with that lonely, somber mood. Everyone looked sad. Someone joked about ending up in Purgatory, alluding to the Westview One Acts. But I couldn't help but feel like that mood was applicable to the situation. It felt infinite and melancholy. We were all dressed up, but it almost felt like we had no destination at all, and that we would keep driving on that bus forever, in our dresses and tuxedos, corsages and boutonnieres. It was weird.