I promise I'll never....

My best friend and I were discussing our moms last night, and we both said there were several things our moms had done that we weren't going to do to our girls. As I was trying to go to sleep last night, I thought this might be a good thing to post about regularly. This first one happened over 15 years ago, and I can just now, barely, laugh about it. You, on the other hand, will probably have no problem laughing.

I promise you, Tessa and Ella, that I will never come out on Madison Street in my nightgown looking for you in the midst of lockdown, standstill Horse Show traffic. I have to set the scene on this one because you totally won't understand unless I do. Each year, our town hosts the World Championship Walking Horse Celebration. More than 100,000 people pour into our town that normally holds a little under 17,000. Each night, when the Horse Show lets out, Madison Street, the main road, is worse than rush hour traffic on the Interstate. It's just deadlocked.

So, during Horse Show 1994, I was 17 years old and had just broken up with my boyfriend. At the time, I had a thing for guys who wore skin tight Wranglers and cowboy hats. Throw in a pair of dusty cowboy boots, and I was hooked. One guy in town fit this mold to a "T." He was the real thing, had even competed in a few rodeos and had the cutest behind I had ever seen. We'll call him JF.

The main past time for kids here during the 80s and 90s was riding up and down Madison Street. It was how I passed many a Friday and Saturday night. It was how I met my first boyfriend, and it's how I finally got to talk to JF. This Saturday night, I was riding around with my cousin and my best friend, and JF had seen the car load of girls earlier in the night and had flirted with us ever since, especially at red lights. He finally motioned for us to pull over at Sonic, and we did. He asked us to ride around in his truck, and we did.

I had a certain time to be home, so my cousin, who didn't have a curfew, invited my friend and I to both spend the night. We called my mom (from a pay phone, no one had cell phones back then) and asked if I could. She let us, but I didn't tell her we were riding around with JF. About this time, we remembered we had to pick up my younger cousin who was at the horse show with friends and take her home. We thought it would be funny to pick her up in his truck and surprise her, because she also knew who JF was. When we picked her up, she wanted to ride with us, but we told her no. She was so mad.

When she got home, she called my mom and told her a bunch of BS about JF. I can't even remember now what all she told her, but it propelled my mom out the door, in her nightgown, into the big brown station wagon and onto Madison Street.

We were oblivious to all of this, having a good time talking and laughing with JF. His personality was just as good as his looks. It was especially good because we were stuck in the middle of traffic and would be there for a while, giving him plenty of time to get to know us.

I was looking out at the traffic when all of a sudden I spotted her. I couldn't help but say, "Oh my gosh, that's my momma."

I guess she heard me, because she yelled out, "Tamara Shea Green, all four of you, get to our house. NOW."

Imagine a sea of cars, a sea of people inside and their heads snapping around all at once to look at the screaming banshee in the big brown boat hanging half out the window, shaking her fist and in her NIGHTGOWN.

My cousin told JF to take us back to her car, and we would handle it, but he wouldn't hear of it. He went with us to my parents house to listen to my mom berate us about getting in the vehicle with a man who was known to take advantage of innocent young girls (this had to be from my cousin, because my mom had never heard of him before this night). All he did was stand against the wall, his hat in his hand and said at one point, "I see my reputation proceeds me here."

To top off the embarassment, my stepfather couldn't let my mother do it all alone. Here he comes, out of the bedroom, in his tight whiteys and sits down on the couch for God and all to see. I was mortified.

Several years later, my husband worked with JF. When JF found out who Brian was married to, he said, "I feel so sorry for you. I would have asked her out, but I didn't want to deal with her crazy mother."

So, I promise, I will never, ever, ever do that to you, girls. EVER.