{"id":1814,"date":"2011-01-07T10:48:06","date_gmt":"2011-01-07T17:48:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=1814"},"modified":"2025-11-02T21:36:56","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T04:36:56","slug":"first-dance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=1814","title":{"rendered":"First Dance"},"content":{"rendered":"

A couple of weeks ago Luke, my oldest son who’s in middle school, told me on the drive to school that he wanted to stay late to go to the dance.\u00a0 He asked and persuaded all in one breath.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

“Mom, it’s only from 3 to 4:30 and you don’t have to dress up and its $4.00 I’m paying with my money… is it okay?”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Is it okay?\u00a0 I thought.\u00a0 Awww.. my sweet boy is going to his first dance!\u00a0 Of course its okay.\u00a0 Hell, I want to go and take pictures!\u00a0 But all that is silent in my head.\u00a0 Instead I answer like this.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

“Well, it sounds fine.\u00a0 Call me when you want me to pick you up.\u00a0 How exciting.. your first dance!”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

He goes off to school and I go off to work, crowing to my friends my geeky son is going to his first dance.\u00a0 I’m so proud!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Then he calls me at 4pm from the school.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

“Luke!\u00a0 How was the dance?!” I ask.
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

“The dance was horrible!!\u00a0 The music was terrible, the snacks were over-priced!\u00a0 There wasn’t any punch and they REFUSED to give me my money back!”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

When I picked him up after a few questions he admitted that he did dance.\u00a0 That Destiny and Boaz, his friends, were there and that nothing “bad” happened (which was my worst nightmare… that he’d get picked on or harassed at a social event like this.)
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

But all his emotion when he called me to pick him up, wasn’t the sound of upset tears.\u00a0 No, righteous indignation had filled his voice (even as I tried to hold back my hysterical laughter).\u00a0 Because I could just imagine him going up to the student body cashiers with his list of un-realized expectations pouring out of his mouth and demanding his $4.00 back.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

My own little Sheldon… unafraid to buck the system and ignore convention when it comes to his hard earned money and being “right”.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I worry a little less about his social interactions!
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n


\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A couple of weeks ago Luke, my oldest son who’s in middle school, told me on the drive to school that he wanted to stay late to go to the dance.\u00a0 He asked and persuaded all in one breath. “Mom, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-joy-of-family"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1814"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3232,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1814\/revisions\/3232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}