"Whoa, Nellie! The dance is tomorrow night, Parker. That's kinda late to be asking her, don't you think?"

"Mom, you don't know anything about girls. Trust me. I know what I'm doing."

After Laynie accepts his invitation and before the dance, Parker spends no less than an hour searching through his mother's things for a small empty jewelry gift box. He finally finds one with the name of a nice Charleston jewelry store embossed on the top.

"I found it! This is the one I want," he shouts to his mother.

When she asks what he intends to do with an empty ring box, he looks at her as though she's stone stupid. "Duh!" he mutters. "I am going to put a ring inside of it."

"Parker, listen to me, son. You just can't up and give a ring to a girl because she agreed to meet you at a school sock hop. She'll think you're crazy."

"Trust me, Mom. I know what I'm doing. I once gave a ring to a girl in kindergarten and it worked. So, please, just help me find one of your old rings that you don't wear anymore. I'll put it in the box and give it to her tonight. And Mom, you should know that sock hops went out in the Stone Age."

They search her jewelry box until they come across a small silver pinky ring with a fake ruby set in the middle of it. He snatches it up like a hungry dog going after a steak. "This is the one I want! It's the most beautiful ring in the whole wide world. She's going to so love it."

He puts the ring in the small jewelry box, then crams it into his jeans pocket. "Okay. Let's go. I'm ready for you to take me to the dance, Mom," he says as he struts out of the room.

When his mother picks him up after what she still refers to as the sock hop, he is grinning all over himself. "Well, Parker. How did you like your first soc ho- uh, dance? Did you and Laynie dance all night long? Did you give her the ring? What did she say?"

He sighs contentedly in the back seat, but doesn't say a word.

"Parker? Is something wrong? Are you all right? You had a good time, didn't you?"

He sighs again. "It was just perfect, Mom. We stopped dancing and went to get some punch and that's when I gave her the ring. She said she loved it."

He sighs again and is quiet for a moment. Then he says, "You know what else she told me?"

His mother is grinning when she says, "No, I can't imagine. Tell me what she said?"

"She told me I was the sweetest boy she ever knew and she likes me."

The boy's mother is smiling broadly by this time, but Parker drops into quiet mode again. When she looks at him in the rear view mirror, he is pulling at the skin on his arms.

"Parker! What in the world are you doing?"

He looks up at her with a goofy grin spread across his 10-year-old face. "I'm pinching myself."

"Why on earth are you doing that?"

"Mom, this is the most perfect and wonderful night of my entire life. I'm just pinching myself to make sure I'm not dreaming."

***********

"Love is like playing the piano. First you must learn to play by the rules, then you must forget the rules and play from your heart." -Author unknown