Practice Makes Perfect

If you read my first blog "In the Beginning...." you may remember that I warned you that I might occasionally give you little pieces of advice  (From time to time I like to tell other people how to live their lives) and here is one of them: If you have young teen-age boys, make them take you out on a Practice Date so they can practice opening doors, practice making small talk and so on.

When our oldest son, Josh, got his driver's permit, I decided it was time for our date. Since he was going to get to drive, he agreed. He played bass violin in the school orchestra (Don't ask. I think the prerequisite was that your mother had to drive a station wagon) so I thought it would be neat to go the symphony. There was to be a guest, Gary Karr, a renowned  bass player, so we got tickets to that performance.

Now, I had never been to a real symphony, only the Oklahoma Youth Orchestra ones that Josh played in and where another mom and I always yelled "Bravo!" at the end like it was the real thing. (Dennis acted like he didn't know me when I did that, I don't know why)  But I watch television.  I know how you are supposed to act at the symphony, all sophisticated and dressed up and everything.  Should you have furs and jewels, you wear them.

Alas, I owned neither furs nor jewels or even a really dressy dress, but I did have a little (stop smirking!) black dress that I saved for funerals and I didn't want to embarrass Josh, so I decided to wear that.  And pantyhose, church shoes and a teeny clutch purse even though the purse was so small I had to leave my coupon envelope at home. (By the way, I heard the other day that the new princess, Kate, is bringing pantyhose back in style. Nobody ever told me pantyhose were out of style!  I just thought everybody was lazy about dressing up these days. I'm always the last to know!)  I don't recall if Josh wore his Youth Orchestra tuxedo.  I don't think so but I'm sure he dressed nicely.

We drove downtown, we parked, we went into the Civic Center in Oklahoma City. There were  enormous crystal chandeliers like in Phantom of the Opera and the performance was exquisite. The soloist could play the double bass like it was a violin! He even made it sound like a guitar once. I acted very sophisticated, like I was supposed to, and pretended that we did this every weekend.  I didn't even yell "Bravo!" or anything.

At the intermission Josh and I made arrangements to meet up at the refreshment counter after our bathroom break. The bathroom there is kind of old, and you know how I love beautiful public bathrooms, but it was functional, and afterward I went into the lobby to wait for Josh where I stood around, acting quite blasé and cosmopolitan in my funeral dress, pantyhose and church shoes.  Many other sophisticated people milled around looking blasé' and cosmopolitan also. Some were greeting friends and air-kissing each other around their furs and jewels.

There didn't seem to be anybody there that we knew but then a lady did tap me on the shoulder. She leaned in confidentially and said "Dear, were you just in the ladies' room?" Oh rats, I thought. Did I leave my little clutch bag in the bathroom? No, I had it in my hand.

"Yes, yes I was," I said, smiling brightly at her.

 "Well," she said, " I just thought you would want to know that the whole back of your dress is tucked up into your pantyhose."

I told Josh to practice not saying a word.