Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, April 26, 1993                   TAG: 9304260368
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MONTY S. LEITC
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

TIME WARPED OH, WHAT TO WEAR TO THE PROM

"Aren't you a little late?" she responded drily.

This surprised - even delighted - me, since my friend's not usually one to joke about her age.

But then she continued, "Seventeen magazine's prom issue comes out in March, for heaven's sake."

"You mean you checked?" I asked her.

"Certainly I checked," she told me. "The advent of my 40s didn't separate me from the world, after all."

For a second, my head filled with visions of my graying friend, haunting the "Juniors" departments of all the major department stores, asking in desperation, "But in the pink tulle - is a 13 the largest you have?" Then I thought better. Even she wouldn't . . . but maybe she would.

"This year it's all romance," she told me. "White princess dresses with big sleeves and beading, lace down to the floor. Ruffles, even. Or mysterious black Elizabeth Barret Browning things. `Carmen' on an English country estate. Capes. Even the boys in Seventeen were wearing ascots."

"You mean pink tulle is out this year?" I asked her.

"What rock have you been living under?" she said.

Personally, I have fond memories of pink tulle. And of blue dotted swiss, too. "I don't suppose . . . ," I started.

But my friend interrupted me. "You know what I don't understand?" she said. `'I don't understand how the features in these magazines can show one kind of clothes, while all the ads show something entirely different. There wasn't one single princess dress in any of the ads. All the ads were sequins. Really slinky sequins, too. The kinds of dresses you see on the Miss America Pageant."

"You watch the Miss America Pageant?" I asked her. Although I should have known.

"I don't know how a girl's supposed to know what to do," my friend rushed on. "Should she buy one of those demure, but very pretty, white princess dresses? Or go for the red lame-and-sequins sheath with the thigh-high slit?"

"We're talking about high school seniors, here," I said. "Do you really have to ask?"

"Well, you can't tell from the magazines," my friend responded.

"Look," I said. "You and I are grown women. We don't need any magazines to tell us what to do."

"Well, I just think it's confusing, that's all," said my friend.

"In fact," I continued, "you and I don't need to decide on prom dresses at all. Ever again."

"Well, then why'd you ask me?" my friend said.

And I said, "I don't know." General depravity, maybe.

Monty S. Leitch is a Roanoke Times & World-News columnist.