Prom Dresses

Posted on May 5, 2015 by Keely

They came in the mail today, a great big whopping boxful. The girls and I had spent a few hours cleaning the gym: they were tired and dirty. Their hair was covered in glitter from the cardboard stars we’d made, and their elbows were streaked with mopwater. “Give me my knife,” I told G. “I think this is…” and they gathered round as I slit the tape and popped open the flaps.

They gasped as one in a single huge tide of breath, and then there was a flurry of shouts and rustling fabrics and a whoosh as a rainbow of colors lit with sequins leaped out of the box and whirled around the cafeteria. “look at this one! Do you think this would fit me?” P held a tiny, sequined dress against her tiny body and nearly cracked the top of her head off grinning. I looked down at the nearly empty box and my own smile grew until the corners of my mouth just about met at the back of my neck. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a shout of joy like that. There must be a special sound that only a roomful of radiantly happy teenage girls can make. I let them look over the dresses for a few minutes, then finally said “that’s it. We’re going to the locker room!”

We left the cafeteria awash in glitter and paper and bits of cardboard and open bottles of glue, and the girls gamboled down the hall exactly like giddy schoolgirls getting ready to try on beautiful prom dresses for maybe the first time ever. I followed, trying not to let tears slip out of my squinty grinny eyes. The bathroom stall doors slammed and dresses hung like prayer flags in all colors over the half-walls. P looked like a pixie in her seafoam and sequins, pulled on over her jeans. Her shoulderblades showed like wings in the back, and she glowed like a tiny moon as she charged all over the building, blushing and glorying in the compliments.

B wouldn’t come out of the stall without her sweatshirt. She was absolutely scandalized by the neckline of the pale gold dress she had on. Eventually, she peeked around the corner, pink-cheeked and flailing in her rush to get to the mirrors and then back to the bathroom stall. I believe the dress was perfect for her: it made her look fresh and regal, like a greek queen in a picture book. “Can I wear that dress?” she asked me a little later, whispering shy, and I put set it in her hands like a cloud.

Another girl held her shirt up to her chest and wouldn’t take it away to look in the mirror until everyone else had turned away. The cut of that dress was incredibly flattering, and the jewel blue color lit her skin up. She took that dress and folded it into her backpack, blushing.

After ages spent helping the other girls zip up and giving compliments and laughing, Miss A tried on a long cream dress. A is one of the prettiest girls I’ve ever seen, with her chin-dimples and elegant frame, and she always wears jeans and a big hoodie that she pulls over her face when someone smiles at her. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her elbows. “She looks amazing,” said C, “it’s so beautiful, A.” G agreed. A wouldn’t step out of the bathroom stall to look in the mirror or for me to see her. I waited.
“Okay, Ms O,” A said firmly with a deep breath. It was a command. She threw open the door, and I walked up to face her. I couldn’t keep the admiration from showing in my smile, and A got totally overwhelmed and shrieked and slammed the door in my face while the other girls laughed and I pretended to faint from the vision I’d just beheld.

My heart nearly burst from all the demure giggles, crooked-toothed grins, surprised beauties, and happy blushing of this afternoon. Thank you thank you thank you a thousand times to everyone who helped make this happen, especially my Pops and our neighbors in Belfast who took the time to hit the post office on our behalf. Of course we owe a staggeringly HUGE Mahsi’ Choh to the Cinderella Project of Maine for this moment. I wish I had a video of the explosive, joyful instant when that box of dresses first opened. It was everything I could have hoped it would be. The girls will never forget this, and neither will I.

Too muddy for too many words

Posted on April 23, 2015 by Keely

Miss A wrote in her journal that “the best part of being outside is feeling the sun on my back. It feels so warm and good.”

This week is culture week, and the students have a half-day of music every day. They are learning fiddle, guitar and traditional dance. The program these folks run is amazing, and the kids are loving it.

For culture week, one community member invited us to his house to see the wolf he'd trapped. Black wolves are prized for their fur along the coast.

For culture week, one community member invited us to his house to munch on dry meat and see the wolf he’d trapped. Wolves are a significant threat to the moose population, which the community relies on for subsistence, so managing wolf numbers in the area is of real concern to the village. Black wolves like this one are prized for their fur by the people who live along the coast.

Some of the kids and I took the music instructors for a walk after the cakewalk last night.

The prom committee made another hundred dollars from the fundraiser, and I won back the lemon cake that had been making my house smell like heaven all afternoon. Only about a quarter of it made it home, though. You can’t not share your cakewalk winnings.

I had girls in the kitchen right up to the last second baking cakes, and there’s only so much giggling one can handle in a small space before fresh air becomes absolutely mandatory. I needed that walk, and the beautiful, silly kids just made it more refreshing.

M built the tiniest snowman! This is the only week of the year so far where the snow has been wet enough to make snowballs. They fly thick and fast whenever I take my students outside for journals.

Feet.

“I’d like to run through that puddle in the morning,” remarked A on our post-cookie walk through the village tonight.

Most of the walk was a game of tag and tangle with Gracious, C’s adorable dog.

We’re excited! The Cinderella Project of Maine is trying to help us get prom dresses, and we made the roll call (about three minutes in) on CNN Student News today! Between that and cookie night, it’s been a real red letter day.

I will never get tired of sunset

Posted on April 18, 2015 by Keely

Luck bestows a lot of twilight on the arctic, but it is migrating rapidly from noon to midnight, and it’s harder and harder to get out to enjoy it. I didn’t come home from this hike until nearly 10:30 on Thursday evening, but it was well worth the lost sleep.

January

Everything I thought I knew about time and space seems very muddled. Sunset in no way corresponds with bedtime, nor does sunrise align with waking. When I first got here, the sun very determinedly rose and then shortly set again in the south. Now it’s all creeping north, sliding along the horizon.The whole arrangement seems very unreliable for something so cosmic. My classroom windows face north, and my avocado is flourishing there.

April

It’s very lively, the way the shadows never seem to fall the same way twice.

One of the most fun and strange things about teaching is how it pushes you to do things you never had any interest in before. My students don’t want to put on a play or start a literary magazine or a garden: they want a prom. Consequently, I have been very busy with, of all things, prom planning. What will our theme be? Who can come? How can we arrange for the girls to get their hair done? How can we transport them through the muddy May village without soiling their shoes? Last night was our first fundraiser, a spaghetti dinner and movie night, and the girls carried it off with style: They cooked, they cleaned up, they announced the event over the radio, they handled disasters and complaints like pros. It was so much better than I expected.

I know what you’re thinking: It’s your first fundraiser?! How can you expect to have a real prom if all you have is $120 and a group of wishful teenagers? Well, dear skeptics, we can’t expect to have a real prom. For a real prom, you usually need more than five boys in school, and it doesn’t hurt to have a local band, or a caterer, or a florist and someplace to rent a tux. Oh well. We don’t, and we have to make the most of it. Because I am their sponsor, we are going to try to get karaoke and laser tag, and to hell with your preconceived notions. I have enough cardboard stuffed behind my couch to make some very respectable prom decorations that can double as cover in the likely event of a laser tag shootout. I’m very pleased with the idea. $110 should get us enough glitter, and the rest we can scrounge. It might not look much like a prom, but it will be all kinds of fun.

If you happen to be sitting on a couple of old prom dresses or bridesmaid dresses that you can’t stand to look at anymore, it might be that my girls could put them back in action.

P.O. Box 81153, Venetie, AK