Shall we dance?

Remember the blog project I did last year with three other women? Well, Froggie decided to resurrect it with me and we each got to invite another friend to join us. She invited a mutual friend (someone I met through her) and I invited a friend whose blog I really enjoy reading. So now it's Froggie, Mom of Many, Moma Rock and Merrylandgirl. Hope you enjoy the topics that we'll be exploring!

This week, Moma Rock picked the topic: What is one of the biggest regrets in your life?

Before reading ahead, first see what everyone else had to say on this topic:

Froggie
Mom of Many
Moma Rock

During my high school years, there were many opportunities to attend dances. Homecoming was in the fall, turnabout was in the winter and prom (for at least my last two years) was in the spring. However, I managed to go through high school without attending so much as one of these dances. I think my biggest regret was missing out on my last chance to attend a dance...senior prom.

I can't say that it wasn't without trying though. I did ask some guys to attend these dances with me. Of course, I was wearing some sort of guy repellant at the time and couldn't so much as snag one date. I probably cursed myself by almost going to the BBYO Invite dance freshman year and then backing out last minute because I found out that the guy was a total jerk (if I hadn't already figured that out from the one date we tried to go on that was completely awkward and horrible). When I was in Student Council, we had to decorate for the Homecoming and Turnabout dances. It gave me pangs of jealousy to see the lists of couples that were attending each time. However, I probably could have gone to prom with someone who is special to me, had I let go of certain inhibitions I possessed.

Before I go on, I want to mention that there was an episode of "How I Met Your Mother" where the fabulous five friends crash a high school prom to hear a band play there. Robin mentions how she never went to her prom, which I can definitely relate to. She and Lily end up sneaking in with two geeky guys who have no dates and later try to get fresh with the women who are pretending to be their dates. Then the guys come to the rescue and they get to dance together. (And Barney in a turtle costume is priceless!)

I met "Will" when he was a freshman and I was a senior. I was assistant teaching Theater Arts class during my free hour and he happened to be in that class. We were shy around each other at first, but then he joined the Forensics team and we became instant friends. At the time, I did not know he was gay. He may have known but wasn't ready to acknowledge it yet. He made my senior year a lot brighter with his smile and laugh. At the time, it was taboo for seniors to hang out with freshman. My friends weren't supportive of it either. The one toxic friend thought that she was above hanging out with freshmen, even though she was a sophomore and my other friends and I were seniors. My sister was also a freshman and also friends with "Will," so it bothered me how prejudiced my friends were about age. While I was not prejudiced about age, I also knew that asking a freshman to prom would carry some stigma that I wasn't "cool enough" to support. If a popular senior had asked a freshman to prom, it would have been all the rage. Alas, that was not my fate in high school. Had I let go of my inhibitions and asked "Will" to go as friends, I think we would have had a fun time dancing and hanging out. My mom would have fulfilled her fantasy of going dress shopping with me, as well. (Although, she did help me find the dress for the Invite dance I didn't attend, but I used it for other formal events.) And I would have had the chance to experience my high school prom.

Instead of going to prom that year, I ended up going to Slugger's (a sports bar that had fun games downstairs) with a few of my friends (unfortunately the toxic friend came too). Then we had dinner at Chili's (this was prior to me keeping Kosher). A few things annoyed me that night...toxic friend's presence because she was just so obnoxious (and not leaving a tip at dinner for no reason), another friend's boyfriend showing up at dinner (I hated him) and one of my close friends getting mad at me because toxic friend somehow convinced her that I was being mean to her (even though toxic friend was playing with my radio in the car, which was rude). I probably would have been better off just working that night or curling up in bed with a good book. Ironically enough, I went to a Bar Mitzvah that same weekend and hung out with a guy even younger than Will (he was still in junior high). If being a cougar had been "in" at the time, I would have been really cool.

Flash forward six years. A past friend (the one who dropped off the face of the planet) invited me to her wedding. She knew that I had just broken up with the guy I had been seeing for a while and still invited me with a guest anyway. By this time, "Will" had already come out of the closet and I decided to do the "My Best Friend's Wedding" thing and invite him as my "plus one." (Oddly enough, there's an episode of "How I Met Your Mother" about inviting a date to a wedding and all the etiquette surrounding such a delicate topic.) This time, I had no inhibitions as we were both adults and we went dancing all the time at gay clubs. He instantly said yes and we had a great time hanging out together. Between the ceremony and the reception, there were a few hours to kill, so we went to McDonald's for lunch (prior to me giving that up for health and Kosher reasons) and then to the Enchanted Castle (indoor amusement park...like a kiddie Dave and Buster's) to play games for a while. We were all decked out in formal wear while playing an aggressive game of air hockey. It was really funny! When we got to the reception, we were placed at this table in the far back with these two boring guys and their parents (because they were apparently the only single guys at this wedding). We kept each other entertained and bided our time till the dancing started (at Catholic weddings, they wait till the entire meal is done before even starting the first dance...at least it was that way at the ones I've attended). Then we had a blast dancing the night away. It definitely made up for me not asking him to prom and we were also able to legally drink by then.

I fulfilled my mom's dress shopping fantasy when my wedding came around, so that made up for all the high school dances I didn't attend. The regret wasn't just about missing out on a rite of passage during my teen years, but also that I didn't have enough integrity to stand up for what I wanted and believed and to say "just screw it" to everyone I already didn't like anyway by just going to a dance with someone I actually did (and still do) care about and who is still one of my closest friends. I would have even asked him in front of most of my friends and the annoying jerks they hung out with, just to show them I could, had I been less afraid of what people would think at that time. If "Will" and I were in our respective years of high school in current times, I would have thrown caution to the wind and invited him to prom without even giving it a second thought. I'm in a different place in my life these days, so it's easy for me to say that now. I'm glad "Will" got to go to his own prom eventually though. At least he didn't miss out the way I did.