Remember back to high school. Now forget the good parts because we’re remembering prom and the bits leading up to it. Well, maybe they weren’t really good for me. The more I think about it, I had a great time at prom but terrible choices in prom dates. Sorry for those prom dates, if you’re reading this, but I’ll explain briefly.

Also, to be clear, I had more than one prom date not because I was such a playa but because at my small town Whitewater, Wisconsin school, both Juniors and Seniors were allowed to attend prom (underclassmen were too but they only did if they were asked by upperclassmen).

Prom can be terrible if you have friends who make having a prom date seem like a really important thing. My friends didn’t do that but I watched enough movies with them to think that I really did need to have a prom date. I still do. It’s a problem that I’m not really caring to investigate. Anyway, I felt the need to ask a girl to prom and twice in high school, I did it. The first time, I asked my ex-girlfriend to go with me and for some reason that still eludes me, she said yes. She ended up being voted prom queen but that’s really not important (it wasn’t then and it won’t ever really be). The point is, I missed out on having a good time because I was trying to have a good time with a girl who really wanted nothing to do with me. That’s life I guess.

Junior prom wasn’t so bad, this awesome photo did come out of it and when I look at it, I think of some really great things about the night that I can’t really put into words. All of them seem to be those, “You had to be in this really specific location…twice,” kind of moments:

[pe2-image src=”http://lh6.ggpht.com/-jvpXlC-Zodo/Tnd9eddFcZI/AAAAAAAAMQw/-1N4e3aY2Jw/s144-c-o/IMG_0019.jpg” href=”https://picasaweb.google.com/111197070419838127380/Prom2005#5654125819443114386″ caption=”” type=”image” alt=”IMG_0019.jpg” ]

Ignore the hair, but I’m pretty sure I look great in that tux.

Senior year, I asked a friend of mine to be my prom date. We had been friends since kindergarten and even after she moved away after the third grade, we stayed in touch. After the fact, I never did scrounge up the courage to ask her why she agreed to go to prom with me when she had recently started dating a guy from her school but again, it doesn’t really matter. Going to prom with her was about as much fun as you can imagine going to prom with a friend who doesn’t know anyone at you school. Overall, Senior prom was less fun than Junior prom.

Until the opportunity arose, I never really wished I had a third chance at making prom a good time. But it did come, and I said to myself, “The third time will be the charm otherwise, I’m swearing off all future proms.”

Ellie was looking at the Madison Children’s Museum website and saw they were holding an Adult Prom. She said she had always wanted to go to one of their events and since it coincided with the time she’d be back in Wisconsin, we got our tickets to go.

I invited all my friends that would be in the area to go with me, and a few of them actually bought tickets.

The tux I’m wearing in the above photo was given to me before prom Junior year. Someone’s family member was getting rid of it and it happened to be about my size (the pant legs still need to be lengthened). I wore it for both Junior and Senior prom along with a clip on bow tie that I got from Goodwill. This time around, I really wanted to wear something more fun but Ellie vetoed my blue leisure suit (I’ve only gotten to wear it once now for roller skating). I went with the tux again.

Before prom, Ellie and I went out for a nice dinner. We were planning on sushi at a great sushi place I know in Madison, but I thought about it too late to make a reservation and there was a long wait once we got there. We ended up hitting up another great place for dinner, but not really what I was shooting for. It was probably a more appropriate a place to eat before prom.

While Ellie’s sister did her hair, I had a beer with my roommate from college. I hadn’t seen him in a while and it was good to catch up. He and his wife, Ellie’s sister, were also going to prom with us. We met up with another friend of ours from college and her boyfriend at the event.

Now here’s my beef with prom at the Children’s Museum. There was a fundraising gala beforehand on the different floors of the building and once we got in, no one was herding us up to the roof where the real prom was and we ended up spending a lot of time exploring the museum instead of getting our groove on. But we were able to make corsages and boutonnieres and there was a slide which you had to climb up to through what seemed to be a rickety piece of construction but it was a lot of fun (I did manage to burn two small holes in the seat of my pants on the slide, though–I guess I’ll have to get a new pair of pants that fit me better).

Eventually, we made it up to the roof with a view overlooking the capital, it’s always beautiful lit up at night. On the roof, we did our fair share of dancing and drinking the illicit beverages of earlier proms.

[pe2-image src=”http://lh3.ggpht.com/-HUNIX0bwK_Q/UiEtRRHwvtI/AAAAAAAARPg/KoBd4_EJvrg/s144-c-o/20130824_232741.jpg” href=”https://picasaweb.google.com/111197070419838127380/20130830#5918061160018525906″ caption=”My prom date 2013!” type=”image” alt=”20130824_232741.jpg” ]

Without a doubt, prom the third time around was the best of proms.