Kicking up my heels

Well, friends, it's been a lovely week for dancing. I taught my first ballet class in a while, but the main accomplishment was that I got out on the dance floor to shake the old booty not once, but twice! It was (have I mentioned it?) lovely.

Tonight at Webster's, my good friend Elaine hosted Frackwater Jack, for the first early dance party of 2019. For those of you still in the dark about these events - get with it! Elaine brings great local bands to play in the bookstore, the cover is only $5, and you get to be home in bed (or blogging, if that is your particular kink) by 10:30PM. The tunes were solidly Gen-X, the sort of things I remember drunkenly dancing to at the Prospect Late-Night Party circa 1988 (shoutout to the Williams College crowd). A little Modern English, and the whole place was on fire.

My friend Paula mentioned how great it was to see all those middle-aged women on the dance floor, and so it was. We haven't gotten a whole lot of new moves in the past 30 years, but something on the floor seems a little different to me. In the past, weren't we a lot more... presentational? Like it used to matter that there were men there, not so much on the dance floor, but....there. Why shake a booty if not to make a point?

I'm shocked when I hear that college students don't really go in that much for dance parties. My ranking of social events was utterly tied to dancing at that age. Top of the list - bands, the ones that covered our best tunes. Second - dance parties with DJs. All the other parties were just warm ups to the main event.

But my experience earlier in the week nudges me to think that maybe things have changed, and not just in the ways that I bemoan. On Wednesday, I was invited to go to Centre Social Dance, a community club that holds open lessons and dances in a variety of ballroom styles. I was blown away. I started ballroom in the late 80s, spurred on by a friend who was enamored of old movies and the Astaire/Rogers style. I dipped into the world again just about the time of Y2K, but I felt fusty and uncomfortable around the new swing dancers who were earnestly and meticulously resurrecting the Lindy Hop. My experience at Centre Social Dance was a revelation. I saw an embrace of fusion and improvisation. A disregard for gender norms. An openness to partnering with all comers. I had a most fabulous time.

While I was there, I ran into an old acquaintance. I first met Jon when he was a young teenager, playing the role of Friedrich von Trapp in a production of The Sound of Music that I was choreographing. He was (even then) a talented musician, but not much of a dancer. He told me on Wednesday how fervently he is pursuing dance and assured me that he could tell me where I could dance every night of the week. But he was also really surprised to see me there. He said that he never thought of THOSE kind of dancers being interested in THIS kind of dance. But we are. At least I am. I can't dance in a social setting without a smile on my face. So, I say to you friends - get out there. What's stopping you?