Lady in Red

I didn't bring any dresses to the Delta. I didn't think I would need them. No formals to attend, no weddings in the forseeable future (my friends are Northern), not even any fancy dances to chaperone (yeah, first grade). It turns out I was wrong.

An invitation to the Kappa Alpha Psi Interracial Alumni Champagne Party through one of the teachers at Shelby School for GSD roommate and me left me dressless in a mall-free zone. So on Saturday, I headed down to Cleveland to do a little dress shopping. The problem is that Cleveland, although it is a college town, does not have many stores. In the first store I went in, I tried on a dress (way too big) and when I asked the salesgirl where I might be able to find a dress, she told me that it wasn't going to happen. Evidently all five of the dresses on sale in Cleveland (barring the ones at Walmart, which I didn't try) only come in sizes bigger than I wear. "You can borrow one of mine, though," she told me. And then she took a break from the store, drove with me to her house, and brought out four dresses for me to borrow and try on at home.

I had never met her before.

I wore the red dress.

Which turned out to be a good idea, because it turned out that the colors of Kappa Alpha Psi are red and white and almost everyone at the shindig was wearing either red, white, or black. My roommate and I went with two other (white Teach for America) friends. We were the only white people there. I felt very uncomfortable until I was a few drinks in, at which point I was loosened up enough to dance to the "Cha Cha Slide" (a packed dance floor moving as one.) It was a fun time. We knew a couple of people there (other teachers), but the rest of the brothers were welcoming. There were about 250 people at the event. 25 were alumni of the fraternity and the rest were friends and family.

Only in the South.