Community Throws Class of ’92 a Party With Egyptian Flair : Santa Paula: Students dance the night away, try their luck at craps and find time to exchange a few teary farewells.

It was the last gathering of Santa Paula High School’s Class of 1992, and Lulu Flores was engulfed in the sweet, yet sorrowful emotions of life marching forward.

“It feels good, but it feels sad,” Lulu said. “You know all your friends are going in different directions. And you don’t know if you’ll ever see them again.”

Parents and school officials, many of them graduates of Santa Paula High School, shared similar emotions that had once swept across them not too many years earlier. And so the community joined together for the second consecutive year to throw a special Grad Nite party for the seniors.

“The kids used to go to Disneyland, but it’s too expensive now,” said parent Michelle Holmes, chief organizer of Friday night’s celebration. “So we just decided to have our own party.”

Holmes said several parents volunteered their time to help transform the Santa Paula Community Center into something resembling an Egyptian temple. In keeping with this year’s party theme, a 13-foot-high papier-mache Sphinx greeted guests at the entrance. Cardboard camels and gold foil palm trees decorated the lobby.

Not all the decorations were a success.

“What’s that?” one student asked, pointing to a five-foot-high triangular frame, outlined with white Christmas lights.

“I think it’s a pyramid,” another said.

Young couples spent most of the evening on the dance floor, bumping and grinding to the sounds of Guns ‘N’ Roses and Nirvana. Others tried their luck at the “fantasy casino,” which featured prizes ranging from a new 13-inch color television to a compact disc boombox.

The grand prize, a $1,000 stereo, would be given away at 5:30 a.m. when the party was scheduled to end. This was the bait to keep students from leaving early and getting into trouble, said Deanna Collins, another party organizer.

“This way they’re not out drinking, or in motel rooms,” she said.

After winning several hundred dollars in play money at the blackjack table, senior Barbara Jean Altis decided it was time for a haircut and facial and sauntered over to the makeshift beauty salon at the back of the community center.

“I’m having a terrific time,” she said as beautician Janet Anderson splashed white powder onto the graduate’s cheeks. “I thought I’d be crying my eyes out. But I still have a whole roll of unused Kleenex.”

She said she plans to report to the Air Force for duty this summer. Like Lulu, she said she also had mixed feelings about graduating but was trying to stay positive about her future.

“It’s like that saying, ‘Don’t be afraid to say goodby to yesterday, and don’t live your life waiting for tomorrow. Live and enjoy each day, because every day is precious.’ ”

In the outdoor casino, senior Heather Hancock watched some of her classmates shoot craps.

“I’m definitely ready to leave,” she said. “I’m really excited about getting away from here.”

Heather grew up in Santa Paula and said she has enjoyed the small-town pace. But she said she was ready for a change. She plans to attend Azusa Pacifica University in the fall to study business.

What about the Grad Nite party?

“I’d rather be at Disneyland,” Heather said.

Like her classmate, Isabel Perez said she also was ready to leave Santa Paula, a town of 25,000. The most important lesson she learned in high school, she said, was “to take chances.”

“I’m afraid,” Isabel said. “But I’m ready to go out there and find new challenges. I’ve been here all my life. I want to go to Los Angeles. I know it will be a whole different world.”

Isabel said she will attend USC in the fall.

Despite the bleak prospect for jobs and threat to college funding, the Class of 1992 remains hopeful of what lies ahead.

“I’m optimistic,” Isabel said. “We’ll find our way. Little by little, we’ll get there.”

Steve Colvard, a first-grade teacher at McKevett elementary school in Santa Paula who was videotaping the party, said many of the seniors had once been his students.

“It makes me feel old” to watch them graduate, said Colvard, who graduated from Santa Paula High School in 1971.

Aside from his four years at Pepperdine University and the one year he spent teaching in Arizona, Colvard said he has lived his entire life in Santa Paula.

“I love it,” he said. “It’s a small town. There’s a real sense of community here, and I think the students feel that.”

Colvard said he has no doubt that many of the students who leave will want to come back to their tranquil hometown.

“Some of the kids want to get out of town,” he said. “A lot of us do that. But a lot of them will come back. They will come back when they realize how different it is in a big city.”