The signature event for our ninth grade group was a New Year’s Eve party held in the Wright family’s basement rumpus room which we futilely had tried to transform into a crepe-papered canopied dance floor. Despite the failed attempt at ambience, this turned out to be the night when our stumbling with dancing and fumbling with kissing games opened our eyes to a promising world.
“We had a wonderful time. …We worked all day decorating. We strung crepe paper across the ceiling and had signs on the wall and it looked beautiful. But that evening when we started dancing, we bumped into the streamers and they fell down. . . .” Scrapbook of the author
We were on the cusp of discovery that particular New Year’s Eve and this party became the event by which all other high school parties were measured. It also was the last time the unimpressed boys tore down the crepe paper before the end of the evening. After this party we seemed to realize that spin-the-bottle or post office or spotlight were just junior high excuses for necking, and the more interesting activity would be to put on a slow dance record so we could tentatively press our bodies together and go from there.
