Do middle schoolers still have dances in garages, carports, patios and back yards anymore? You know the kind where there are stringed lights, cd players and black lights? The soundtrack to your life (Slide by Goo Goo Dolls or Dave Matthew’s Band Crash) plays at the moment that THE GUY asks you to dance, and it all seems to be happening in slow motion. You’re thankful you wore your favorite pair of Calvin Klein jeans with your Boston Birkenstocks and that you sprayed a little Sunflower by Elizabeth Arden on, thinking the combination of all 3 things must have brought you some type of good luck and that God above performed some type of miracle. Your brain can’t process what’s happening as your best friend nudges you forward with a slight cough to get your attention. Then, if THE GUY asks you to go for a walk, your palms automatically start to sweat, you pop a piece of gum in your mouth, and wonder if he has braces and you have braces, will you get stuck?

Time seems frozen in 1997. There may be an opportunity to snap a picture if someone has a disposable camera or a polaroid camera. For now, however, the only evidence of this dance and THE GUY asking you to dance is being etched into your memory. He smells like Tommy Hilfiger and is rocking a pair of Timberlands; you recognize the scent because your best friend and you constantly spray it on cards at Parisian’s and stick in your Sak purses.

The crowd notices when you two arrive from your walk. No one has to know whether or not you actually kissed; a white lie to save face shall suffice. The boys cheer as if THE GUY won the winning touchdown in overtime. Not much will change when you are adult in terms of how men react to their friends advancing with women. Your friends rush over and giggle and that will not change either when you become an adult.

The next CD plays One Headlight by the Wallflowers and in the next morning, you are 36, scrolling through Facebook. A familiar song plays on your XM radio and you remember a 12-year-old girl, a time, and place. You smile… “Me and Cinderella, we put it all together…”