When I leave our unit to call an elevator, our neighbor Nancy is in the hallway, already waiting for one. “My, you look very handsome!” she says, and I tell her thank you and that I’m dressed up because some friends of ours are hosting a prom. She gets a kick out of this, says that’s such a great idea. On our way down, I ask her what she’s up to with her weekend, and she says she’s going up to Boulder to see her sweetheart of 36 years. He doesn’t much care for the city so it’s her weekend ritual to drive up to spend time with him. “Enjoy your prom!” she says, as we exit, and I respond “You too!” before fumbling through a correction.

At prom we leave the door open, a golden foil fringe serving as a curtain into The Company. I stand outside taking tickets, and from where I stand I can see, through the veil, some of my favorite people posing for photos against a starry backdrop, a softbox casting warm glows across stellar outfits, eyes and sequins glinting.

I am in a melancholy mood, so this feels like a metaphor—this being on the outside, observing something lovely and not quite being a part it; seeing you in a way you can’t see yourself, interrupted by shimmering strands of twisting golden light, so happy and handsome.

Standing here I feel like the ghosts of prom past, present, and future, or like someone being given a tour by such. “Is this real?” “Can they see me?” “You could have had had this!” “Can they tell that I’m here?” “Why is no one talking to me?” “You had this before!” “Do they know that they’re glowing? Or is that just a kind of filter you’re overlaying to underscore the preciousness of this moment?” “You know, I think you’ve got the wrong guy actually, I’m like the opposite of a workaholic—and it’s not even that kind of a company.” “You can have this again!” “Don’t you think this is a little heavy handed?” “Hey wait a second, I actually am here, with a hot date to boot!”

Lauren T., who is cohosting with Lizzie, interrupts my visions to say she’s so nervous. She jokes about putting out a suggestions box. Questions if the snacks are good enough. We talk about getting those rating button devices with the faces on them so she can get instant feedback, wonder if maybe she should go around asking everyone if she’s being a good host, or asking if she’s being too overbearing about wondering if she’s being a good host.

It’s chilly out, and I am a ghost, so I have few other visitors. But from this perch I can also see actual kids on their way to actual proms, in both large and little clusters. I see their limos driving by, and I wonder how all their nights are going. There is something so sweet about it—to think of all of them experiencing this rite of passage, a singular moment, an evening they’ll remember for a long time. I wonder how many of them feel ecstatic or shy or in love or in ache—if they’re happy. I think about telling them that they can try again, in like ten years, and it’ll be so much better—that they can just host their own thing. That Halie and Lizzie and Lauren T. did, and it was and is will be perfect.

I eventually step inside. I dance with Livvy, the two of us our own little masquerade ball. I watch my friends dance. I capture what I can of it. My heart is full and a little exhausted. It is perfect, and tragic, and gorgeous, and fleeting, and healing.

Livvy and I stay just long enough to see Allyson and Lauren T. win prom royalty, and then we head home. Norton joins us for part of the walk, and on the other side of the Highland bridge we see Dave’s Hot Chicken and realize we are hungry. We order and sit, and Norton tells us about a TV show he’s been watching.

On the way to wash the Dave’s Hot Chicken Sauce off my hands I pass two actual prom kids, and I wonder what kind of night they’re having. I think about telling them they can try again, and I wonder about their willingness to speak on the record for a newsletter with a tiny but dedicated readership. As I wash my hands I work on the courage to talk to them.

When I come out, Livvy is already talking to them—has already told them we were also at a prom. She introduces me to them, and I ask if they’re willing to be interviewed.

Shay is in a long white strapless dress, and Ruben is in a black three-piece suit with a black shirt and lavender bow tie. They are both 17, both in their senior year of high school. Their school, one of five that they think are having their prom today, does a combo Junior Senior prom, and this is the first prom for both of them. They went as friends.

I ask why they didn’t go last year, and Shay says “I wanted to save it,” before also adding that she was a bit reclusive last year. She didn’t have many friends, so she didn’t really have anyone to go with.

“I just wanted it to be special,” says Ruben.

Shay and Ruben made a couple more friends recently, so they all went together, at a place near here. But the two of them left early and are here at Dave’s Hot Chicken because, according to Ruben, “it wasn’t that fun.”

“There was a bunch of line dancing” says Shay. “Like the Macarena.”

“What about the Wobble and the Electric Slide?” I ask.

“Yeah.”

They generally seem tepid on prom. This is not what I hoped for. This will be harder to work with in an intro.

Norton joins the conversation and asks “What would have made prom great?”

Ruben says the music could have been better. He says that they were trying to keep it 2000s. I ask who the DJ was. “Some random guy in his 20s.”

Shay says that she wishes they would have maybe played some Justin Timberlake. I mention that he was around in the 2000s, so she clarifies that she’d like to have heard some of his 2010s stuff.

“I’m not familiar with Justin Timberlake”, says Ruben. “But it would have been cool if they played FE!N by Travis.”

“They played it before we got there. Like while it was light out still,” Shay tells him.

They talk to each other about how that doesn’t make any sense, and I think about how it doesn’t make sense that they didn’t crowdsource their playlist. I also think about how lucky we are that Earl happens to have DJ equipment and says yes to a lot, and that I really hope he can learn to feel more comfortable saying no, but if he’s going to overextend himself, I’m so grateful that—

“Are you two sober right now?” Norton asks them.

“Yeah, very sober,” says Shay.

Livvy has already given it away, but I try to tell them the thing about how they can have another prom some day, if they want. I am just a pretend ghost, so I can’t conjure a vision for them, can’t show them what it will look like for them to be older, more at ease in themselves, laughing and dancing to songs they picked themselves. I can’t show them what it’s like to feel similar and new feelings, but to have better tools to work through them. I don’t even have a photo to show them of the people twice their age, just a few blocks away. All I have is this vague suggestion at another chance.

“Would you go to a prom in your 30s?” I ask them.

“Yeah, I think I would,” says Shay.

—Ivan

Happenings

This week:

Mary Ann’s Book Club: Invisible Women, Monday, April 27

(Again, this has passed, but leaving it in for the record)

Dense, heavy, and important, this book explores data bias and how it leads to and perpetuates gender inequality. So far, it’s a bummer of a read, but will definitely be a good conversation.

Free

Check your bias (out from the library) →

Weekly Wednesday Worknight, Wednesday, April 29

The Company is about combining creative work with good friendships. Make an appointment with your side project this (or any) Wednesday at a Worknight, where we oscillate between enforced, focused, quiet time and optional chatty social time.

$5, free for Company and Moonlight members

Work together →

PowerPoint Party No. 38, Saturday, May 2

Twelve people giving 7-minute presentations about whatever they’re currently into. At past parties, people have presented about moon trees, film, Cottleston Pie, Lise Meitner, and Bad Bunny. It’s a wide mix.

It’s a nerdy and sincere crowd that cares a lot, and we’ve met some of our favorite people at these.

Want to present? We’ve got a waiting list (and your chances are decent, actually!). Want to just show up and meet interesting people and learn about what’s fascinating them lately? That’s great too. Bring a friend, or come alone and make a friend.

$10, free for members and presenters

Make a point of coming →

Future Weeks:

The Original Fiction Show, Sunday, May 3

Hear stories and other works from Ivan, Alex, Madeleine, Earl, Joe, and Morgan, in a one-off, 2-hour show of original creative fiction. The opposite of Glint in many ways, this show is all about untrue stories told live, carefully read from notes.

Listen up →

Creative Writing Workshop: Wonder, Monday, May 4

Once again: 90 minutes of lightly directed writing around a theme. For the fifth workshop, our theme is Wonder.

The theme will be explored through a series of prompts, and we’ll have progressively more time to respond to each. At the end of the night, we’ll have the chance (though not the requirement) to share.

Note that this workshop is not for feedback or editing—the purpose is to generate new writing.

Bring yourself and something to write with.

$10, free for members

I wonder if you’ll come →

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Also coming up: Glint: Weather (May 12), Anniversary Party (May 15), In the Making (May 21)

Nostalgia

Do you remember Morgan’s first workday? The shared lunch of baby shower leftovers? Our discussion of effective altruism and horses and fires?

How Jessica S. was suddenly and chaotically in the mood for and prepared for a run? How Alex had always been trying to get people to run with him but was unprepared that day, and she expected to never be in the mood to run again?

How on the recess walk to REI they ran ahead for a little?

Do you remember Earl confusing Alex about confusing moms?

Our Moonlight Report without Livvy? The return of the Creative Code meetup?

The lunchtime lore drop of Earl‘s storied past as an ice cream chef? That it all started with a discussion about non-competes?

How I left early, and then Earl, and Norton took a nap, and Jessica worked, so Simon took a solo walk for recess?

Do you remember the small lunch, on the most locked-in workday? The layup practice with coach Madeleine? How Alex drained a 3 from downtown? The conversation about the biggest changes sometimes also being the most mundane?

How you tested to see how loud bouncing a basketball inside really was for our downstairs neighbor?

The Worknight walk, and the determination that one side of the lilac bush was more fragrant than the other?

Do you remember your lunchtime plans for adversarial emails?

How someone had mentioned boba, so we took our recess walk to Krāv? How during and after, Beth held court, and we listened, and wondered, and rated our anger?

Or the tiny In the Making? How we finally learned about Norton’s year-long project? How I shared my delayed year-related project? That we inspected Chris’s prints, understood and held Sam Ad.’s knitting pattern, and saw the work that went into Alex’s ethology app?

Do you remember the Friday before the second prom? How you hung stars and fringes and set up lights?

Or the day of Prom? The happy hour at Forest Room Five? How so many of us squished together on the stage? How Ryan trapped and released the wasp?

And do you remember the outfits? Rebeca the only one referencing Van Gogh’s fashion? The couple and friend and group photos? Did you see all the dancing? The carefree, the skillful, the playful? Do you remember the moment when Prom Royalty was announced? How Allyson was crowned first, and then there was a tie between Lauren T. and Jessica S.? How they played Rock Paper Scissors to break it? Do you remember the slow dance that followed? Or the three random girls who came in during Dancing Queen, started a conga line, then left when the song was over? The line dancing? And the crew that made it all the way to the end?

Bureaucratic Minutiae

• Paperwork has a few official functions: report on the last week and talk about the next. Unofficially, it is also a creative writing outlet for me, and, to those of you read it and enjoy it, I’m so grateful for your time and attention and feedback. It is so fun to get to write about a place and people that I love, and it is so nice to hear when you also think it’s fun to read. It is less nice, but very valuable, to hear when I’ve caused hurt. Last week, I took some creative liberties with the Glint photo captions which I now wish I hadn’t. It was, as many are, a Glint with some very vulnerable stories, and while I often chose to take a different approach to the captions than the recaps in Bureaucratic Minutiae, I now regret—thanks to some feedback—having minimized and imprecisely summarized the stories for humorous effect. Every story is a gift, and I want you all to feel supported and appreciated not just by the audience and this place but also by how your stories are represented in this newsletter. Please know that I’m always grateful for your feedback, and that I’m always interested in doing better.
• In last week’s closing credits I forgot to acknowledge the additional reporting from Livvy and Morgan, who recapped events (and whose reporting of said events was credited inline).
• At the hiatus-breaking Creative Code Denver Meetup No. 13, Slaton demoed “Ravioli”, a project he’s been contributing to. Ravioli is a browser-based collaborative place to make music, ascii art and shader visuals. We then jammed and chatted the evening away. Recap by Norton
• At Worknight: Norton cleaned his bathroom, made tofu and cleaned his kitchen; Jaime edited 1 article and created the camping/hiking list; Jacob did all the Japanese review; Alex wrote notes for chapter 1, wrote 5 thank yous and finished his weekly reflection; Madeleine highlighted the interview transcript, posted the DZM video and responded to Xandra; Will implemented zine versions; and Earl posted final Nerd Nite tickets. Recap by Alex
• At In the Making: Norton revealed his untitled blog platform, Ivan worked on his 2026 LEGO art, Chris shared the process of setting up and creating his Risograph art prints, Sam Ad. walked us through the double knitting knitted hat patterns she has been working on, and Alex reflected on the process of building Ethoscope.
• Prom was hosted by Lauren T. and Lizzie, with setup and takedown help from Ivan, Allyson, Harrison and Earl, and others eternally lost to memory. Management would like to especially and officially commend Lauren T. for going to battle at Costco and spilling her own blood.
• Finally, a reminder that The Company is a member-supported gathering place, and if you know any of us, you’re welcome to pop in any time for free (outside of events). If you know that one of us is here and you’d like to come by, reach out and we can let you in.

Photos

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This issue of Paperwork was written by Ivan with additional reporting from Jessica S., Alex, Madeleine, and Norton, and was shot by Ivan, Gus, Madeleine, Norton, Lizzie, and a mysterious unknown photographer (was it you? maybe Chris?). Photo selection and editing by Ivan and Lauren T. Editorial support was provided by Livvy and Norton. Jessica P. provided valuable advice on the proper handling of personally identifiable information of minors in newsletters with tiny but dedicated readerships. This issue, and The Company itself, was made possible by the support of our members, Halie, Drew J., Justin, Mason, José, Mary Ann, Trevr, Allyson, Lizzie, Elijah, Michelle, Jim, Jacob, Mark, Sabrina, Beth, Dani, Chris, Will, Marcia, Rebeca, Sarah, Alex, Jessica P., Jessica S., Ben, Sam Ad., Christof, Ryan, Lauren T., Madeleine, Simon, Adam B., Gus, Lauren S., Earl, Maddie, Bennett, and our newest member, Sylvia.

Do you know anyone in the Denver area who might be looking for creative community? Feel free to forward this email along to them. Everyone loves Paperwork.

😘