PROM NIGHT

by Jesse Robertson

Prom night is an exceptional night. Very exceptional indeed.

Sam has been looking forward to tonight all year. It's prom night. He's not usually a big party person, but tonight he is making an exception. Normally he has to be home at midnight, but tonight his parents are making an exception and he doesn't have a curfew. Most weekends he doesn't have a date, but this is prom night and it is most certainly exceptional in that respect.

Sally is Sam's date. She, too, has been dreaming about prom night. Normally a date for her would mean dinner, a good movie, and home by eleven. But prom night is exceptional. Tonight there will be partying and dancing and she doesn't have to be home until one o'clock a.m.

Sally usually feels comfortable without a lot of beauty aids, but this afternoon she spends a full hour putting on makeup and another hour getting her hair just right. She's already spent the last month in a tanning bed. Normally she wouldn't wear a low cut dress or a high hem line, but prom night is the exception. She wants to look irrestible for Sam.

Sam picks Sally up and they feel more excited to be together than ever before. At the prom these two otherwise normal teenagers become real party animals. They give themselves totally to the atmosphere of the crowd and let go of all their inhibitions on the dance floor. They shake, wiggle, and thrust when the music is fast, and they cuddle and caress when it is slow. They feel very much in love and very free--exceptionally free.

At eleven they leave the prom to join some of their friends at a private party. The beer and wine coolers flow freely. Sam and Sally are not drinkers, but prom night is, after all, an exception. After an hour at the party, this teenage couple slips out to spend some time alone together.

Both of these young people are good kids, but now they drive off into the dark in Sam's car under exceptional circumstances. Tonight they both look the best they've ever looked. The dancing and the alcohol have made them feel especially infatuated with each other. They have been thoroughly convinced by both adults and peers that prom night is the most important night of their lives and a night when one is allowed to make exceptions. Will the next few romantic moments be exceptional for Sam and Sally? Would you want your child to be one of them?

On prom night across America hundreds of teenage girls will get pregnant and dozens more underage drinkers will die in drunk driving accidents. Would someone please tell them that prom night is not worth risking the rest of their lives. Would someone point out that a year from prom night most high school seniors won't even be hanging out with the same friends, much less dating the same person?

God bless the parents who dare to talk eyeball to eyeball with their child about prom night, and to keep a safe curfew, and who demands to know where their child will be. And God bless the teenager who chooses to be an exception by living the Christian life every day and every night, even prom night.

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Source: The Gospel Reminder, bulletin of the Bay (AR)church of Christ, May 4, 1997.