How the Prom Found Me
I got interested in proms – well, not in high school. Like the rest of the geeky girls, I went to the movies on prom night. (My prom-eligible years happened back in the Stone Age when girls had to have dates to get into the prom – no date, no prom. This part of high school seems more humane now.)
Proms got interesting to me in 2007, thirty-something long years after I happily shook the high school dust off my feet. Actually, it wasn’t so much proms that got my attention as homecoming – another high school tradition that passed me by. I was attracted to homecoming because my boss at the community college where I work told me to be – always a motivation for deep interest.
I expected a disaster because never having attended a homecoming, I didn’t have the slightest idea how to help coordinate a homecoming queen event. Fortunately, the girls knew what to do. They were serious about the affair even though the college is small and so is the normal game attendance. My main role was to write down the names of the nominees for the announcer, to order the flowers and sashes, to staple fallen hems, and to hold hands (metaphorically) with nervous hopefuls and disappointed also-rans. It was fun. The girls were beautiful, even the basketball players. One minute they were loping across the court in saggy uniforms and almost literally the next, they were floating down the runway in evening gowns.
At first I tried to come up with a homecoming paper doll, but that was hard because of the problem of team names and mascots. I couldn’t think of name and mascot that had a universal feel. So then I thought of proms. Well, actually, the thought came in the mail. The sponsor for student activities at my school gets big catalogs of geegaw – some of it for proms (even though we don’t have a prom). I happened to pop into her office one day when a catalog had landed on her desk. It was a eureka moment.
Although I work at a college, I’ve had in mind high school proms when I created Prom Night 2007 and Prom Night 2009. I used current prom magazines (I didn’t know there were such things, but there are!) and tried to make the paper dolls look like sweet and pretty teenage girls. I’ve found that most little girls of almost any age enjoy the idea of swishy skirts and high heels, so I haven’t been surprised that Prom Night 2007 has been downloaded many, many times (it’s free). I hope Prom Night 2009 will be as much fun.
Feel free to download either or both of the Prom Night paper dolls at the website.