Last month, I was invited to our company-wide “Prom” luncheon. I happily declined as it was scheduled for a day I was already going out of town. There’s no way I wanted to sit around the office all day in my old prom dress while reliving all of our high school prom memories. Considering prom wasn’t really my thing the first time around, I really felt no excitement at the prospect of a round two.

But then they moved the date to a time I’d be able to go, offered free lunch for participants, and my two friends were really, really excited about it. So I accepted the meeting invite to attend prom, which then meant I needed a prom dress. I texted my mom to ask her for my prom dress and the conversation went similarly to this:

How weird must I be to where my mother doesn’t even question why I would ever want my high school prom dress?

Anyway, she remembered to bring both dresses and I was well on my way to reliving prom.

A week before work prom, one of my coworkers sent out a survey to nominate Prom King and Prom Queen. My votes were easy: I wanted to vote for my one friend who was clearly the prom queen in high school, and the foreign guy so he’d feel welcomed to our office.

Then when nominations came back the day before prom, I discovered I was nominated to Prom Court.

What kind of alternative universe do we live in where I get nominated for Prom Court? It must be one of those things where they nominated me because I’d be really awkward at being queen. That makes sense. 

The evening before, I realized I had yet to try on my prom dress to see if the thing would even fit. I’m not sure if it’s exciting or not when it did. In my head, I was way skinnier in high school, but maybe I just had a warped sense of self back in the day. Regardless, I was stoked to find out I am not a beached whale like I thought I was, and I had secured my dress for the next day.

The next thought that crossed my mind after successfully zipping myself into my dress: why in god’s name did I like this dress so much back in the day? It’s basically a sparkly black and white quilt of every different type of pattern. Ah, to be young with no sense of elegance.

Going into work, I was having mild heart palpitations. The week prior, my car broke down on the side of the road, so I was envisioning that happening again, but this time with me in a prom dress. I can’t really picture how that conversation would go, trying to explain to a trucker why I was middle-aged and in a prom dress. 

Thankfully, I made it to work in one piece without anyone noticing my odd attire. And then the day went smoothly. The dress was surprisingly comfortable, I got free food and took quite a few pictures. Really, the only downside was not being named Prom Queen, but then again, being nominated was a hell of a lot closer than I got in high school.

And you know what’s cooler than being on the Prom Court in high school: being on the Prom Court in your mid-twenties.

Fine – it’s probably the exact opposite.