Taking seniors back to the future

Susan Lachner is helping put the senior back in Senior Prom.

The 42-year-old Costa Mesa volunteer is in the midst of planning a

dance party for the patients of the Milestone Health Care Center, a

Costa Mesa convalescent home.

She is coordinating the effort with Milestone staffer Anabel Lopez

and a team of volunteers largely drawn from the ranks of Calvary

Chapel Costa Mesa and the church’s high school. Lachner and her

daughter Grace have volunteered at Milestone for about a year,

working on fun activities for the patients including bingo, pizza

parties and field trips to venues like the Orange County Fair.

She discussed her plans for the dance, which will be held

Thursday, with the Daily Pilot’s Andrew Edwards.

What kind of activities will there be at the Senior Prom?

We’re going to have pictures first, just like every prom usually

starts out with -- couples’ pictures, group pictures, that kind of

thing. They’re going to sign up for a raffle and then they’re going

to enter on a red carpet and have their names announced. There will

be dancing, a little bit of music by a small instrumental group from

our church, from Calvary Chapel, and then a short message by the

pastor and lots of dancing. Did I say raffle already?

How many people are involved in the team that’s putting this

together?

Well, we’re sort of unsure about that yet. I’m saying maybe 10

nonfootball players. We’re going to have between 15 and 20 football

players. We’ve got the pastor and his wife, so I’d say there are

about 30, 40 involved in putting it together.

What are the football players going to do?

They’re going to get dressed up. They’re going to arrive and find

out which room their date is in, go pick her up, give her a rose and

take her in for the night.

What kind of planning goes into this event?

Anabel and I have been going to thrift shops now for a few months,

looking for clothing for everyone, and I think we’re just about

finished with that -- just putting the refreshments together and

getting things for the raffle. Decorations are going to be a really

big part of it. The theme is the “Days of Wine and Roses,” so we’re

going to have a lot of roses everywhere just filling the room and

grape vines and wine glasses and things like that -- just making it

really pretty and memorable for them.

What kind of music is there going to be?

The theme is the “Days of Wine and Roses,” which is Henry Mancini,

and so there’s going to be a lot of that, “Moon River,” and we have

one student who has burned a whole CD, oh, five CDs, beautiful old

music we know that are [from] eras that they will enjoy. A lot of

Mancini.

What do you enjoy about volunteering here?

So many different things. The people, of course. And the

activities that have already been planned. They’re just always

different and innovative, and they’re just fun to get involved in. I

think more than anything, though, we just enjoy just hanging out with

the people. Just the little things -- being able to scoot them around

in their wheelchairs and just help them with the mundane things that

need to get done.