B is for Ballroom Dancing

When I was 16, my friends and I started going to a social dancing class once a week. It was a place that we could hang out away from home, have fun and keep fit as well. It was also a good way to meet new people.

We did that for about a year or so, and then we started taking medal classes. In a half hour class once a week we would learn a routine, and then after about 3 months, we would take an exam during which we were scored on our performance. I learnt the cha-cha, rumba, samba, jive, waltz, foxtrot, quickstep, and my favourite – the tango. It was fun and kind of challenging and it meant that when we went out to formal functions, we could use our skills on the dance floor.

So we would dance and have fun every week, and when we turned 18 we started going to clubs that played Latin music so that we could all dance and drink and have a gold old time. It’s a time of my life that I remember pretty fondly – particularly the clubs, because bourbon does amazing things for the grace and flexibility of your body. Or it makes you think it does. Either way, dancing after a few bourbons was good fun.

Then, the year that I turned 19, some of our group decided to start taking lessons to do a bit of competition dancing. I like to reflect on this time as being the beginning of the end – or the last waltz.

Suddenly, everything was technical this, and posture that – and when I moved, I began to feel self-conscious. In classes, no one wanted to fool around and have fun. The competition crowd stuck together, and everyone else was on the out. When we went out to clubs, the competition crowd only wanted to dance their routines with their partners, which left those of us who were just out for a bit of fun sitting on the sidelines looking at our watches. No amount of bourbon could bring back the enjoyment to those nights.

In the social classes, a noticeable divide started between the competition dancers and the rest of us, and all of a sudden it wasn’t fun anymore. We had stepped out of the world of fun hobbies and into the world of bitchy dancers with bad fake tans, Strictly Ballroom style.

Not long after that, I stopped going to the social and medal classes. It just wasn’t fun anymore. It’s only when I go to events like weddings that I get a bit wistful about it all and wish I could go back. But even then I get a reminder of it all when KJ wants to dance. He was one of the less obsessive competition dancers, and every so often he’ll head off on the beginnings of a routine that is entirely beyond me and it transports me back to those classes.


Lately I’ve been tossing up the idea of taking some swing dancing classes. I love the way the Lindy-Hop looks. I’ve tried to convince KJ to come with me, but he’s not really interested, and I’m not enthused enough to push it – I’m worried that it will be end up being the same thing – a fun hobby that is ruined by overzealous people.

For now I guess I’ll just have to content myself with dancing around the house while I do the vacuuming. The vacuum cleaner doesn’t care about my technique or my posture. I wonder if bourbon or two would make the vacuuming easier as well?