August 06, 2012

if i recall, our prom theme was "wonderful tonight"

this past weekend, i drove up to new jersey to visit my parents.  while i was there, i noticed a familiar-looking piece of fabric draped over a chair.

"wait... is this.. my PROM DRESS?" i asked incredulously.

my mom had found it while cleaning, and thought i might like to have it - maybe if i had any formal events coming up.

i laughed out loud, because i weigh roughly 25 lbs more than i did in highschool.  when i was soaking wet. and holding weights.

but my mom pointed out that it was actually in my (current) size and urged me to try it on.

well shit:

now, it's not like this fit WELL - it took 2 of us to get the zipper up, and my definition of "breathing easily" had to be liberally reinterpreted - but to my surprise, it did technically fit.  confusing.

so when i got back to virginia, i pulled out my old prom photos. i suspected that at the time, the dress was not quite so.. form-fitting.

(i realize there are A LOT of things to talk about in this photo, but for now let's just focus on the dress)

not only was it not form-fitting, i'd say "fitted with the same precision as a burlap sack" would not be too much of an overstatement.

oh hell yes, these are in a homemade, yellowing photo album! 

this is what life was like for skinny girls in the 90s, kids: they didn't make size 0 clothing yet. we just had to wear the stuff that fit our height and hope it didn't look too stupid when it was 3 sizes too wide.

in other news, how hot was my prom date!?  RIGHT? if you remember that picture from a few days ago of me as a freshman, you will understand how amazing it was that i graduated as a normal-looking human with a HOTTTT older man (he was in college by then. it counts) as my date.  BE JEALOUS, other 17 year olds in 1998!

(the reason for the weird corny backdrop on our "official" photo, by the way, is because our prom was held in new york city.  and not just anywhere - at the waldorf astoria. i had basically the best prom in history.) 

so i guess the moral here is that if you want to be able to say you still wear the same size you did in highschool, make sure you wear giant, baggy clothes in highschool. it helps immensely.



19 comments:

  1. Holy crap, you could totally wear that as a wedding/formal dress and be perfectly in style! Contrast to my purple, sequined, fake-satin prom dress with the big old rosette thing on the off-the-shoulder neckline, which was not...QUITE so re-wearable.

    I love "(i realize there are A LOT of things to talk about in this photo, but for now let's just focus on the dress)." Ha ha ha!

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is all sorts of amazing.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I love this too much to explain.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Awesome!

    I think that your prom was better than ours! The Waldorf would have been much better than that damn boat...

    And he looks just the same these days... well, without all the hair! :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Oh god, the boat! I forgot about the boat. Geez.
    Alice, I love these highschool memories. But clearly there are benefits of getting older, too!

    ReplyDelete
  6. I wondered why you'd be posed in front of the Brooklyn Bridge.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I recently pulled out the dress I wore to homecoming in 2001 and miraculously, it also fit. Then I went and found a picture from that homecoming and yeah, it was all kinds of baggy and unflattering back then. At least we can both say we still fit in clothes from high school! As long as one has a pretty loose definition of "fit"

    ReplyDelete
  8. I need to know more about the picture. :D

    ReplyDelete
  9. I love trying on old prom dresses when I'm home. The two piece dresses were popular then, so I have a little more leeway with the sizing. Not that I'd ever really want to wear them in public again...

    ReplyDelete
  10. animalcrackers7/8/12 10:39 AM

    I love this times a thousand. It makes me want to find my prom dresses (sized in a similar manner!) when I'm home in a couple weeks. Though, I am pretty sure one of them is a 2 piece dress, which I don't think needs to see the light of day.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Amanda, it wasn't just the boat, but also the busses being late and getting stuck in traffic!

    ReplyDelete
  12. amanda & tyler - i missed the boat one entirely! perhaps one of you should scan in some photos of that for me? :)

    ReplyDelete
  13. (HAHAA. "i missed the boat." true in more ways than one.)

    ReplyDelete
  14. LOL!!

    You didn't miss much, I think it was raining also, so we didn't even get the great NYC skyline.

    I think I have one picture from that prom of me and my date in front of Upper. Not sure where it is now...

    ReplyDelete
  15. I have a bunch of those yellowing photo albums! Ah, nostalgia.

    I do not think I could fit into my prom dress, which, by the way, my mother made me because girls who wore a size 14 had very limited options in cute dresses unless I wanted to go as a grandma. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  16. You look pretty darn good in that dress! I'm loving everything about these pictures. heee

    ReplyDelete
  17. I kind of love that your date didn't wear a tux to prom, yet still looked totally appropriate (well, maybe except for that long hair - ha!). And I'd also say that you're rocking that dress ... then and now!

    ReplyDelete
  18. I don't even want to LOOK at my prom dress, let alone try it on (it wouldn't fit, trust me). You, however, are rocking that dress!

    ReplyDelete
  19. I love this. That is such a nice prom dress. Mine was purple and had a collar and sleeves. I don't know either.

    ReplyDelete