August 21, 2008

Confessions from the Carpool

Summer nights

By Shana McLean Moore
Special to the Times

I’ve been a sucker for summer since sometime between my first and seventh viewing of the movie “Grease” during the summer of 1978.

Just 11 at the time, I had yet to experience the sensations of summer love that Olivia Newton John and John Travolta’s characters, Sandy and Danny, shared. But I did understand enough to swoon vicariously in my Cineplex chair while jotting down a few mental notes about how I, too, could “have me a blast” with some of that summer lovin’ that “happened so fast.”

If my memory serves me correctly, the ingredients for the good time boiled down to a suntan, a break from the academic pressures of the school year, and meeting a tall, dark and handsome boy my parents would never approve of who would rescue me if I swam by him and got a cramp. Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh.

In a natural progression of logic, I spent the next 10 summers being “saved” by every lifeguard along the California coast in search of a Sandy experience of my own, and the next 20 summers after that smiling nostalgically about the couple of Dannys who bought my act hook, line and life preserver.

It all seemed like an innocent rite of passage—until this summer.

It just occurred to me, you see, that my youngest daughter is of the same age I was when I first saw “Grease.” This also means, of course, that I, the former “swooner,” am now raising two daughters who are well into the summer swooning demographic themselves.

And it makes me wonder: How in the name of all that is right and pure has this movie not been burned and banned by responsible parents everywhere?

For the record, I am a reasonable person. I have no problem with suntans—provided that my girls have come by them despite the layer of SPF 50 I have them slather on. And believe me, I’m all for the break in homework and test preparation. After all, who do you think cracks the whip during the school year to rein in those who are too young to appreciate how their choices in middle school affect the courses they are prepared to take in high school, which affects the kind of college that will accept them, which is ultimately the deciding factor as to whether or not they will become not just the first female president of the United States, but the first sister act? I assure you that my calloused hands need the summer off just as much as my daughters’ weary brains do.

But, honey, within these plans there is no room for summer lovin’ with the likes of a Danny Zuko. If that boy were to show up on my porch, I’d turn the shine on my minivan into some “Greased Lighting” of my own with the hair on his knucklehead.

Yes, I said it: the same boy who gave me chills that were “electrifyin’” when I was coming of age would be singeing me with the voltage of an electric chair if he were pursuing one of my sweet Sandra Dees.

This realization makes me wonder where Sandy’s parents were during the summer of love and the school year that followed. Were they not concerned that their daughter morphed from Polly Puritan in a poodle skirt to Lucy Libidinous in black leather?

The only way I can make sense of it as a parent is that the movie was running long and they had to edit out the role of Sandy’s mom, the lovely Mrs. Olsen. Otherwise, I’m sure we would have seen her take control of the situation. In fact, I like to think of her lurking on lane seven as the lustful duo went bowling at the arcade. I also see her dressed in some crisp sand-colored capris as she tried to blend in with the beach landscape while shadowing them during those strolls when they drank lemonade. And with my whole heart, I also know Mrs. Olsen would have intervened sometime before 10 p.m. so they’d have no chance to make out under that dang dock.

Just as sure as summer leads to fall, I now understand that Sandy’s mom breathed a huge sigh of relief when it turned colder and that romance seemed to end. Because there’s just something about those su-uh-mer ni-ights that makes a been-there-done-that mamma want to buy a shotgun.

Shana McLean Moore is a resident of Almaden Valley. She invites you to listen to her free podcast and read more of her columns by visiting www.caffeiantedponderings.com.