In search of the perfect prom dress

It's been quite a year for prom preparations. As Mel Gibson notes in that funny movie, "What Women Want," prom is all about the dress. Our exchange daughter, Merete from Norway, has had a whirlwind dress-hunting adventure through five cities looking for "the one." It's been interesting this year because her parents just happened to be visiting from Norway right in the middle of the national dress-hunting frenzy. It's good for them to see what host parents do to make their American prom a night they will never forget.

We spent one marathon day hitting store after store in San Francisco. Kari, Merete's mother, was up for the challenge of finding the perfect "prom" dress, though she didn't really know what that meant. She'd hold up a dress and Merete would say, "That's really pretty, but it's not a prom dress." What is a "prom" dress? Kari kept asking. So we showed her a few typical examples. But we hastened to tell her it shouldn't look like a "pageant" dress and it shouldn't look too much like a "prom" dress. Too prom-y. Understand? Well, no. The best I could do was tell her when Merete put on the right dress, she would know it.

In San Francisco, we must have tried on 40 dresses. I say "we" tried on the dresses, because it really feels like that. All three of us dashed through the display racks, carrying all the "maybes" around with us, then waited in lines for dressing rooms -- sometimes half an hour at really popular prom stores like Macys Union Square. Kari got a real kick out of the cranky American moms she watched in the dressing rooms while their daughters tried on prom dresses. She could mimick those women's faces just perfectly. The women we met up with at the end of the day at Nordstrom were openly frustrated, upset at the cost, upset at the time, just tired of shopping for this event that several said was just way out of hand. The dads and boyfriends lined up outside the fitting rooms to offer their opinions about the dresses also amused our visitor. One boyfriend was very patient, but he knew the reality of the situation -- "My opinion doesn't really matter. She'll get whatever she wants." So young yet so wise! Merete was matter-of-fact and said the dads are there for just one reason, to make sure nothing's showing. Again, how soon they learn!

Merete's father, Paul, was really thinking this was all a little excessive. At dinner, Merete said she'd like to go to a shop in Capitola, which is right near Santa Cruz, their next stop. She found her Christmas formal dress there. No, Paul said firmly. "I don't want to take up our traveling time with more shopping." Merete's little bottom lip came out, she put her head down on the table in a classic princess pout. I was impressed with Paul's impressively strong stand in the face of an advanced case of prom panic. My husband and I looked at each other, wow.

The next day we talked to Merete on the cell phone. How's Santa Cruz? Good, she said. We're in Capitola shopping. Ha. We knew it. He was spineless just like the rest of us.

She has found the perfect dress, by the way, right at home at a little boutique called Starlett O'Hara in Fig Garden Village. It's short and brown with sequins and beads on the bodice. Very pretty on her. She found two good dresses there, in fact. Her dad got another shot of culture shock when the store refused to sell them the first dress Merete liked. They have a registry there, the clerk explained, and they won't sell the same dress to two girls going to the same prom. How awful would that be to see a girl in the same dress? In America, it's a trauma. Paul didn't know whether to be amazed or amused; he'd never experienced a store that wouldn't take your money for merchandise. Seemed perfectly sensible to me, although it is upsetting when another girl gets a great dress first. Anyway, it doesn't matter because Merete found another one. Kari told me that she thought Merete might be starting to panic. The shoes were no problem. She found a pair of strappy bronze sandals while touring Las Vegas with her folks.

For all those mothers, fathers and boyfriends who are getting really impatient with the stress of the whole prom thing, remember this. We've sent off a whole lot of girls to their first proms and afterward they always say the best part was the preparation: the shopping for the dress with their moms, dads, sweeties or friends; getting just the right accessories and, of course, the pampering -- manicures, pedicures, getting their hair and makeup done. At the end of the night, prom itself is just a dance, but all this attention on them, well that is something many girls remember all their lives.

Are you having a big prom adventure, too? Whoa, let's talk.