By: Hailey Brandon
Prom isn’t what it used to be. You used to just go put on a dress, do your own hair and makeup and you’d be more than happy with the outcome. Nowadays, the pressure’s on. You have to make sure your plans, pictures, date, dress, shoes, hair, nails, lashes, brows, skin, makeup, jewelry, teeth, and tan are all absolutely nothing less than perfect. Here are reasons why the “Prom-Queen may turn into a “Prom-Zilla”.
- Finding The Perfect Date
If you’re not already in a relationship, it may be difficult to find yourself a suitable prom date. He has to be tall enough that you don’t tower over him in your heels, easy going and he has to get along with ALL of your friends and their dates. There is already a limited amount of senior boys and it is already so hard to find a local date. This makes it almost impossible. Most girls fantasize about a romantic promposal with a catchy pun and maybe some flowers, but the sad reality is that you are still single. It may be time to go find yourself a date.
- Planning The Pre-Prom Party
The pre-prom party is something that every senior looks forward to no matter who you are. It is a time to hangout with close friends you made in the short four years you got to spend together in high school. It is a celebration where everyone is almost at the finish line ready to start the next chapter in their lives. Or at least this is what I thought this was all about. Planning the prom party is actually a lot more difficult than you may think. You have to make sure that everyone invited gets along, so they don't cause any problems and can keep everyone happy. It is important that you organize the limo, food and photographer and make sure everyone is contributing food and money for the limo and photographer. Since everyone else also has a million things to plan, pay for and figure out, it can be pretty tough to track everyone down. You may be short a little bit of money until a few days after prom but it's all worth it in the end… isn't it?
- The Dress
Your prom dress is something most girls dream about for all of highschool. Five months before prom most girls have already called dibs on their dream gowns. As if the options weren't already limited enough. One month before prom and your mom finally decides to take you dress shopping. You made sure to screenshot all the dresses on the “prom dress facebook page”. Now you’re ready, and you won’t get anything the same or even slightly similar to the other girls. After trying on about 35 dresses you begin to lose hope. All of the dresses have either been too tight, too loose or make your body look completely shapeless. There might be one or two that you don't mind the look of, but you had the choice of either hot pink or mustard yellow. Your self confidence is as low as it has ever been and you are almost ready to give up completely. After browsing through the entire store three times, you spot a dress tucked away in the back corner. This is probably some other girls dress who didn't want to make a down payment. Once you take a peek at the price tag all of that joy turns into fear. $650?! Are you kidding me? This is more than some women spend on their wedding dress. After spending what felt like hours trying to convince your mother to buy you the dress, she finally agrees. One less thing to worry about. Once you get home you immediately post the dress on facebook. She who shall not be named posted the same exact dress over an hour ago. It's too late to go back now so you just close your laptop and get over it.
- The Shoes
Once you finally pick out your dress, it is now time to pick out some matching shoes. It can be pretty difficult to find a nice pair of shoes for a good price, especially if you already have an idea of what you want your shoes to look like. Regular shoe stores have a very limited selection of high heels and it is especially difficult to find a nice pair for a low price. Since prom dresses are generally long, most people wouldn't really consider the shoes to be a big deal. But this is your big day and everything has to be absolutely perfect! After wandering through a few basic shoe stores without finding anything you like, you decide to walk into a more “high-end” store and instantly spot the shoes of your dreams. They may be $200 but you're definitely going to wear these silver sparkly shoes again, won't you? Without thinking about it for too long you hand the cashier the shoes and swipe your debit card. The cashier reminds you that the store has a no-return policy but at least now that you have these glamorous $200 shoes you will definitely wear the dress better than… “she” does. Once you get home and send a picture of your shoes to your best friend, she reminds you that someone has almost the exact same shoes as you from payless for $35. Something else you will just have to get over.
- Getting The Perfect Tan
A large majority of the girls going to prom don't want to have their cold, dry winter skin in their prom photos. There are a few ways to go about this. You could either go outside and try not to freeze to death in late May, have trust in yourself and attempt to perfect the self tanner look. You could get a patchy, two toned, orange spray tan, or put your health at risk and go to a cancer causing tanning bed. Of course all of these options have some pretty negative outcomes. This doesn’t stop these tan hungry teenage girls. Around prom season you may see a lot of miserable looking senior girls with blotchy orange skin from a self tanner mishap or you may see someone gorgeously bronzed everywhere but her face, elbows and knees. There isn't really any good way to get a nice tan this time of year unless you go to jamaica a week before prom.
- Appointment Booking
Booking all of your appointments for prom can get messy. You have to figure out time, dates, rides, costs etc. It's hard to get appointments in close locations because every school's prom is usually around the same time and they fill up fast. You never really know how long an appointment will take because while some makeup artists take 20 minutes, some take over an hour. Some girls have to get their makeup done at 8 am because that is the only time the makeup artist can take them in. After they get their makeup done they have to try to keep it from melting off in the heat all day. Now, it's time for hair and if you're lucky enough you'll get a hair appointment as late as 2 pm, so it may have a chance of surviving against the humidity. There are so many other appointments to organize and pay for before the actual day of prom and some of them include, but are not limited to a manicure, pedicure, eyelash extensions, facial, eyebrows, tanning appointments etc. Some girls don't put this much money and effort into prom, but some care a lot more than others and the sky's the limit for them.
- Prom Day. School Day.
For some reason all of the teachers and staff at the school don't understand how difficult it is to be a senior this time of year and they actually expect you to attend 50% of your classes the day of prom. Before rushing around to a bunch of different countys to make it to all of your appointments, they expect you to go and sit through math and science for half the day. If they really think you will be able to focus on the anatomy of a frog on YOUR big day then they must be crazy. All of the girls will be on the edge of their seats waiting on the bell from the moment they sit down to the end of class.
- Appointments = Disappointments
After all that time and money you spent planning all of your appointments you wake up at 5:45 am and have your mom drive you half an hour to your makeup appointment. There is no mirror in front of you, so you're unsure of the progress she is making. The only thing going through your mind right now is how you're going to have to fake a positive reaction, so that she doesn't feel bad when she put all that work into it for nothing. 45 minutes of sitting in her chair and you finally feel her start to spin the chair around. Woah! Who is this stranger looking back at you? There's about 3 inches of foundation sitting on your face that is a shade too light with some heavy black eyeshadow to match. “I love it!”, you say trying to sound as honest as possible. Now you're going to have to go to class like this and you will be the talk of the school all day. After sitting through those painful classes, it's finally time to get your hair done. If you were lucky enough to find a ride to your hair appointment that is 45 minutes away from home, you have to rush out of class and jump into the car. By the time you get there, you will have no time to spare and you have to rush into the chair. The hairdresser will probably try to make conversation about how it is such a big moment in your life and you will pretend to agree but in the back of your head you are just so ready to get it over and done with. The hairdresser gets done with your hair and it is nothing like what you asked for, but it will have to do.
- The Crowning
Now that you have gotten through school, all of your appointments and the pre-prom party, it is time to actually attend prom. Everyone looks gorgeous and slightly stressed out because they have all most likely had similar days as you. You dance all night but there is one thing you have been anticipating since before you even booked your first appointment… who will be crowned prom queen? After all that hard work you put into looking “perfect” for prom, they finally reach their hand into the ballot box and take out a crisp, golden envelope. They step up to the microphone and slowly start to peel open the seal. They pull out a shiny white piece of paper and slowly start to announce this year's prom king and queen.
All of your hard work and dedication was just put to waste… was it? All of the money spent, the dress, the shoes? Why wouldn't it be you? This is because this isn't what prom is all about.
Prom is about coming together with all of the people who you went to highschool with and celebrating how far you have all come in the past 4 years. It's not about who has the most expensive shoes or dress. It is about spending time with each other and appreciating each other for shaping you into the person you are today.
