I prompose that you all calm down a little bit. Creative commons image from  France3470.

By Cameron Kay 

“In the spring, a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.” That was Tennyson, for those of you wondering how pretentious I actually am. We’ve officially come to that wonderful time of year where teenage boys (girls, you also have the opportunity) humiliate themselves in hopes of getting a date to the only dance of the year not hosted in half of the school gym — prom. It’s every girl’s dream to be asked to an overpriced dance with a bouquet of Trader Joe’s flowers and an abhorrent pun on a poster (really, it is).

The declarations of young love are endless. In the past, there have been fireworks and plastic lawn flamingos, just to name a few. This year, we’ve already had a crop of boys shed both their dignity and their pants on the senior patio all in the name of high school dating.

The very term ‘promposal’ personally makes me sweat a little bit. I’m not sure if it’s the word’s homonymic play off of ‘proposal,’ but it has my inner commitment-phobe screaming, and I feel like I’m not the only one.

There’s a boy, who shall remain nameless, in one of my classes who just heard me say the word ‘asking’ and immediately shouted, “Oh God, stop talking about prom!” (we were actually talking about people who were asked to write letters for the latest Bard issue). The stress on boys (or girls — break the stereotypes, people) to find their inner romantic side must be incredible.

Look, I’m the type of person who squeals and drops the Ben & Jerry’s at the end of Bridget Jones’ Diary when Renee Zellweger kisses Colin Firth, but the hype around prom (and semi if we’re being honest here) is just too much. Be romantic, but remember to save some romance for your marriage proposal(s) and anniversaries later in life.

Imagine in ten years or whatever , when you’re proposing to your significant other. You might just want to take them out to a fancy restaurant and pop the question right after you finish your overpriced lobster (you can find a two for $20 deal in Maine — they’re cheating you here). They say yes at first, but then a couple weeks later she finds out that you asked your prom date out with some pompous string quartet. The resulting argument ends with a ring being thrown at you and the statement, “Well, if you care so much, why didn’t you marry Billie-Jean Kent?” Boom. Your engagement was ruined because you went too hard on your promposal in high school.

As someone who has never received and will likely not be receiving my own promposal after this spiel, I feel completely qualified to say things like that declarations of high school love are overrated and that The Notebook isn’t even a sad movie, it just makes my eyes sweat from the glare of Ryan Gosling’s sweltering physique.

The point is, you don’t need to pull out a marching band to ask someone out. Just be genuine and whomever you ask will be thrilled.