Editor's note: This column was first published on the author's blog.
I asked my son if he was going to go to the church dance, and he looked at me like I had asked him to jump over the moon. So I called one of his friend’s moms to see if she was making her son go, and a few hours later, a group of boys, some more reluctant than others, were on their way to the church without a basketball.
A miracle indeed.
Before my son left, my husband and I offered to pay him a dollar for every girl he asked to dance. He shrugged his shoulders and grunted, which of course means “yes” for a 15-year-old, and we were elated that we had thought of bribing our son to be a gentleman. Innovative parents were we.
Then he texted:
There are like 20 people here.
What? I was confused. This tri-stake dance had been well-advertised with posters and plenty of announcements. Surely, the cultural hall would be so packed with kids that they would have to slow dance with each other the entire time. Sigh.
I didn’t understand it. Where were all the youths? Hadn’t they showed up in droves for the trek? Hadn’t the stake been required to charter seven buses?
Still, I had high hopes and waited eagerly for my son to come home. There was so much to ask him. With whom had he danced? Had he talked to any girls? Had he actually tried using complete sentences?
But when he got home, he grumbled and turned on the television.
When I tried to pump him for more information, he said, “Mom, it wasn’t like that, OK?”
I grilled him later only to have him say, “I don’t know, Mom. I wasn’t paying attention.”
His dad asked, “What? You didn’t notice whether people were dancing?”
“Well some were kind of jumping around together and then some were doing the Napoleon Dynamite dance and some were just sitting around.”
“When you say jumping around together, you mean they were just jumping all together in one big group?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he answered.
Why don’t kids pair off for a dance anymore? Why is it so hard for boys to ask? Since asking a girl to dance is such a gallant thing to do, and since most 15-year-old boys are dying to be gallant, I don’t see what the problem is.
What can we do about it? I have an idea that will solve this whole problem. Back in the times of Jane Austen, a lady was given a card that allowed fellows to reserve certain dances with her during the night. Those were the good ol’ days, when there were so many men wanting to dance with a girl that she had to make appointments. If a man asked a girl for the first two dances, then whoa! He was pretty into her. She could go home and put that card under her pillow, kissing his name to her heart’s desire!
Maybe we need the dance cards now, but I think it’s the boys' turn to get them. After a boy asks a girl to dance with him, she signs his card. Three signatures means he gets access to the refreshment table. Since his best friend Joe has been known to down six of Sister Brown’s famous peanut butter cookies in under two minutes, he quickly finds the girl closest to him, mumbles something unintelligible and points to the dance floor. She smiles at him and pulls out her pen.
Maybe 10 dances get him a free trip to Taco Bell.
Parents could be a great support. When the boy comes home, he better have 15 names on his dance card or it’s going to be 15 days before he sees his Xbox again. They may even have to call a few of the girls for verification, just to make sure the signatures aren’t forged by a few of the buddies who proudly claim they can write like a girl, but I’m pretty sure the system will work.
Becky Blackburn is the mother of five children and is a native of Price, Utah. She graduated from BYU's J. Reuben Clark Law School. Contact her at beckyblackburnwrites@gmail.com.