Throughout the early years of high school, prom is the one big event that everyone looks forward to. It is relentlessly romanticised in movies, shows, and social media everywhere. The night when you get dressed to the nines, no matter the cost, dance with your high school sweetheart, and live happily ever after. However, for me, this is not the case; I have learned the reality of what prom really is.
To me, prom is the finish line. Prom represents an ending to everything you’ve worked for, and the time to finally let the stress pressure go. Prom is a celebration of community. No matter how you see it or think about it, prom is about the people.
Over the four years of high school, we spend our time building friendships, meeting new people, and talking a lot. Prom is our time to be with those friends and celebrate each other without the pressure to do it the “right way.”
So much of prom seems tedious, expensive, and completely pointless, but when you break it down to its most core elements, prom is a time to get dressed up and dance around with people you have been getting to know since the very beginning.
Prom was not always something I looked forward to. Prom, snowfest, and homecoming are those things that I never thought of in my early years of middle school and high school. I remember having friends in middle school who told me all about what dress they would wear, what makeup they would do, and who they would go with, but none of that ever mattered to me.
Now that I am a junior and this is my last year at Northwest High School (NWHS), I realize these dances never mattered because I did not understand why people thought they mattered. The dress, the date, the flowers, and the makeup, none of that was ever what prom was about to me.
I had the opportunity to go to prom my freshman year with a small group of friends, and I truly believe it was a gift. I spent the whole night with people I had only ever seen around school in the hallways.
Still, that night I got to know their personalities in an environment where they were completely and unapologetically themselves. It was genuinely the most fun I had ever had in one night. Dancing with my friends without a care in the world, and getting to know strangers, I would continue to talk to them for years to come.
As I approach the end of my last year here at NWHS, before I move states, I think back to every memory I have made of these people, people I’ve known since middle school, who have taught me so much about life. I am truly grateful. I am thankful for the lessons these people have taught me about who I am, how I want to treat others, and how I want others to treat me. Prom signifies the end of all of it; the fairytale ending to the adventure that high school was for all of us.
