Since January of 2014, I have been the Social Coordinator for the Upper School Student Council. The social coordinators are busy all the time, but Prom season is arguably the busiest time of the year. On the morning of Prom, I awoke at 6:45 a.m. to continue setting up for what was supposed to be the best night of my junior year. Many days and hours went in to making this night the best it could be.

I had to leave set-up at 1:00 for make-up and hair appointments, but I had confidence that the rest of the committee could handle the left over responsibilities. On my way to Prom at the Founder’s Club, I couldn’t help but be a little nervous about how everything was going, because we were running late, and I hadn’t seen the finished venue, themed Poseidon’s Paradise.

As I arrived, I saw that the venue was decorated almost exactly how I envisioned. Some of the helium balloons had fallen, but in a weird way they looked better that way.  Many people approached me to tell me that I had done a good job, so my nerves subsided and I relaxed.

Everyone seemed to be having fun, there were poker battles going on in the game room, people dancing to the amazing DJ outside on the porch, and some were enjoying the ice cream bar and root beer floats in the dining room. All of a sudden, at around 10:oo everything came to a halt. The power had gone out.

At first, every room fell silent. No one was really mad. We just waited for the power to come back on.

After about 10 minutes some senior boys decided to break the awkwardness of the situation by shouting, “Somebody say ‘ayyy.’ We want some AC!” followed by the rest of the students “ayyy, we want some AC!” This was probably because they were wearing full tuxes in the now hot and humid ballroom. Soon we heard that the power probably would not return, so a call was made to see if we could leave a little early for After Prom.

Mr. Brewer said that it would be fine for us to arrive at After Prom early, so we started to gather our belongings and head for the limos parked outside. After Prom is a party the school throws for ODA students to discourage the stereotypical prom night.

As we were all walking out, the power turned back on, but everyone including the DJ and caricaturist had already packed up so we continued on to After Prom. Even though Prom was cut short by 40 minutes, many students, including me, agree that it was still a success.

I have been overwhelmed with positive feedback since the night of the event, and can’t wait to plan homecoming in the fall.