None of us went to “Homecoming” our freshman year of El Dorado High School, but as sophomores, friends Jossette, Paul, Laura and I decided we would go. We actually participated in every possible thing that year and the four of us were together for most of it. The Homecoming football game against Foothill High School was a big deal complete with a big rally and a new theme for each day of “spirit week.” There was Tacky Tourist Day, Movie Star Day and the infamous Senior Toga Day among others. Jossette was directly involved with the football game as a flag girl with the marching band, so Paul, Laura and I sat in the stands cheering on Jossette and the team both.
At half time the floats that had previously rolled down Placerville’s Main Street that afternoon were on display with the Homecoming Queen candidates riding on board. That display of rolling colored tissue paper sculptures seemed pretty cheesy to me and I half thought I would like to volunteer the next year to help build a float, thinking that I could do a much better job. Then I thought better of it, for I was too involved in other interests to add that to my list. Lydia Samaniego, an exotic beauty who could be mistaken for actual royalty in another setting, justly received the crown as Homecoming Queen.
Jossette lived very near the high school and could walk home, but my Dad picked the rest of us up to take us all home after the game. The next day, Paul and I had big plans to make the girls dinner rather than going out to a restaurant. I’m guessing this was my big idea and since none of us could drive it seemed practical as well as kind of fun. My mother dug up a few recipes she thought I could handle and I picked “Chicken Fricassee” because it sounded the most fancy. Paul was in charge of drinks and desert and he made a red velvet cake. We decided to serve the dinner at Paul’s house, but I did most of my prep at my house. Armed with my timing directions for getting everything to come out of the oven hot and on time, we were assured of a fine dinner. When I told Jossette the name of the dish we were serving, her mother referred to it as “Friggin’ Chicassee” for the next three years.
Jossette’s mother dropped off she and Laura at Paul’s house and all dressed up in ties, v-nick sweaters, dress pants and brown Sperry topsiders, Paul and I entertained the girls with our usual brand of sophomore humor we all usually enjoyed. Paul’s parents went out to dinner to leave us alone to do our thing, so it was really up to us to take care of everything. I had to keep going into the kitchen to check on things. I got the idea to put on an apron and hide it under my sweater. I sat out with the gang chit-chatting about this and that and mentioning how I had to keep track of time for the oven. Then I announced that it was time to take dinner out of the oven and stood up, letting the apron drop out from my sweater, transforming myself into insta-chef, and made an exit into the kitchen. This incited the desired effect of the girls falling over with laughter.
The girls were surprised that the dinner was rather complicated and yet came out so well, as if boys couldn’t put a dinner together. A lot of fifteen year old boys might not be able to turn out a gourmet dinner, but I had help from a mother who was quite a clever cook, as well as I had spent my eighth grade year making dinner almost every night when my mother went back to school in San Francisco and wasn’t home during the weekdays. Paul’s cake was spectacular and my very first red velvet. Paul’s parents came home right on schedule and his father drove us to the dance at the school gym.
I assume we had pictures taken, though I don’t seem to have any evidence of this, and had a great time dancing to a live band in the small gym, which was much easier to decorate and made a nice environment. When dances were held in the big gym, half the gym was always empty while the dance was down at one end. I was a bit envious of the older boys arriving in blazers and stylish looking suits, though plenty were doing the v-neck sweater and tie as Paul and I were doing. Eric Hagstrom, a foreign exchange student from Sweden, looked the most pulled together. His European cut suit, shoes, tie and haircut were so sophisticated and made all the rest of us look like the small town hicks we were. He was the nicest guy in the word, infiltrating every click in the school with his sunny disposition and participating in both sports and the arts. He even played the disc-jockey character in our production of Grease that year. Just his luck for Eric to be placed in Placerville rather than any number of more exciting places, but he sure made the most of it and seemed to always be having a blast.
I don’t know how much Paul actually cared about dancing, but he seemed to always be willing to go along and had a good time being part of the group. On the other hand, Jossette, Laura and I were avid dancers and were out on the floor most of the night. After the dance my father was waiting to pick us up and we gave Jossette a ride the few blocks home. Paul got out to walk her to the door like a gentleman. Realizing that the headlights were lighting up Jossette’s door, my father was thoughtfully discrete and pulled back as if to turn the car around, thereby taking the lights off the door. Earlier in the week my father had tried to have “the talk” with me about dating and said that if I might want to kiss my date goodnight that it was appropriate and I should do it. At that time he didn’t know I was gay, but I did and kissing anyone goodnight was not in my thought process, but now I got the message that it might be expected of me. I might have been a little nervous about it, but not for the kiss itself or what a kiss might imply to my relationship with Laura, but because it was all wrapped up in my general wish to just not deal with my sexuality if I could help it. Things like the expectation of a kiss after a Homecoming dance brought my adolescent issues to the fore and it made me uncomfortable, but I figured I could man up and kiss Laura goodnight when the time came. I found out later that Jossette had taken full advantage of her darkened doorstep and gave Paul a doozy of a kiss. Paul never mentioned it and I never brought it up with him. When my turn came at Laura’s door, my dad again backed those headlights away from the door and the kiss went well I thought.
The interesting thing about the relationship between the four of us was that, although Laura and I always pared off and Paul and Jossette always pared off, we weren’t “dating” each other. We were a unit moving from party to dance and back again together. This suited me fine and I had a very enjoyably social sophomore year with my unit. Although I don’t seem to have any photos of that Homecoming, I do have photos from my senior Homecoming when I didn’t go with Laura, Jossette and Paul. Now I have no idea why and I remember that “the unit” wasn’t even on the scene. I went with a girl named Amy that I had met during the previous summer doing the Interarts program. I kissed her at her door too, though I did my own driving. I felt the kiss was my duty and perhaps she felt it was her duty too, for although we remained friendly because we were both in the school musical together, we had little to do with each other after that goodnight kiss.
Save for that sophomore Homecoming dance and the senior prom, the dances of high school all seem to blend together, but I was at most of them. It seems that after the spring of 1983 there were no more live bands at the dances and it was always a deejay. I’m sure that was the more inexpensive choice and in the end I don’t think any of the students minded. We liked our “Thriller” and “Footloose” as well as if not better than some live band.
At our twenty year high school reunion, Laura and I went together and got out on the dance floor to do our usual routine, but the dancing at that event didn’t really go over. Everyone sort of moved out into the hotel lobby to talk while the deejay was left almost alone in the ballroom to play music to himself. When I’d pop my head in there might be a few thirty-somethings twitching for old time sake, but most of us just wanted to catch up. We were missing Jossette, but Paul showed up and he and I pulled up a couple of chairs and just sat and talked and talked. We had been neighbors together and school chums and double dating partners, but I hadn’t seen him since the ten year reunion and that’s how it goes. I did reconnect with Jossette for a very short time thanks to Facebook after not having heard from her since I was twenty and Laura and I have never lost touch.
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