The red carpet was downtown-ish Indianapolis rather than the Kodak theatre in California, but there WAS a red carpet at Clay Miller's annual Oscar party. We haven't managed to get there for the last few years, but I'm holding firm to my plan to be less boring this year.
So we dressed up. Black tie was encouraged, and I modeled a few dresses for Ali and Jeff, trying to decide what to wear. As I modeled, I was wearing my glasses, no makeup and my hair was scraped back and up into a ratty ponytail. So I was a vision.
"Uh. Mom. You might want to think about wearing a bra if you're going to wear that one," advised my shorter fashionista.
When I drove Ali over to the Ogdens where she hung out while we were gone, I hadn't made a final decision about what to wear. I was not looking any better, either. The Ogdens don't live far. I was wearing my bedroom slippers, an old sweatshirt of Jeffs and my own yoga pants, hoping I wouldn't have car trouble or run anyone over.
Around 10 or so, when I picked Alison up, I'd spent some time with every heating implement in the house short of the stuff in the kitchen. I'd forgotten how hard it is to be a girl, but after a shower, a hair dryer with straightening serum, two flat irons with straightening spray, a wide-barrel curling iron and a set of hot rollers, I had my rats nest of hair into some reasonable shape. But I still had a long row to hoe, if you know what I mean.
I'd discovered some gold heels in Alison's abandoned dress-up drawer. The last time I remember wearing them was at a Christmas party at the Governor's residence hosted by Frank and Judy O'Bannon. It seemed appropriate then that I wore the vintage gown....
Jeff dragged out a bow tie, a newly tailored suit and we were off. I'd forgotten how a well-made gown feels swirling around your legs. And when one of the guest -- a sweet elderly woman I'd never met -- leaned over to tell me, "You have the best costume on here, dear," I decided the effort was worth it.
It was a lot of fun. When we went to pick Ali up, we were still in the Oscar finery, of course. Her reaction: "Oh my gosh, Mom. What did you DO to your hair."
Never mind that she's shanghaied me lately into straightening HER rats nest....She relented though and agreed it wasn't too awful.
We'd spent the previous evening freezing our toes off watching Drew Tokash play hockey. While our toes were cold, it was fun trying to keep up with the boys on ice and catching up with Amer, Lyn and Ginny Reed, Amer's mom.
The girls went black light ice skating. Or to hear Alison tell it, she spent the night falling on her bum. Somehow falling with a friend there to pick you up takes the sting out of it.
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