Part Time Dancer

A while back I was spending so much time rehearsing for dance performances that I realized I was treating it like my profession.

I’m not a professional ballroom dancer. I’m a professional writer. Sometimes a winnowing of time and energy has to happen.

Now, I dip into the dance studio once a week for my lesson, to enjoy the company of Lawrence Black, my beloved teacher and old friend, and to keep my skills from going entirely rusty.

And, a few days ago, I did take part in the dance studio’s semiannual showcase, with 28 couples dancing to a great variety of tunes and in a great variety of costumes, from the stunningly naked to the completely covered cowgirl—and with tunes chosen to suit these two extremes.

The level of dancing was stunning, and some people in the sold-out audience looked literally stunned. I expect many have never seen this kind of dancing—salsa and country-western is more often performed here—except perhaps on television. The six or so teachers who give individual and group lessons had every reason to be proud of their pupils.

The atmosphere in the curtained-off corner that was the ladies’ dressing room was electric, with almost or entirely naked women jerking up pantyhose and slithering into costumes. Perhaps the gentlemen’s dressing room, in another curtained-off corner, was more sedate, but on our side, women showed our ability to be close and cosy and helpful, even with naked strangers…

Lawrence loaned me an orange and pink ballgown with gauntlets and neckband and other accessories whose use I never discovered. Made for a shorter and smaller woman, the ballgown was a tight fit; I had to yank it on with the side zipper zipped since I didn’t think I’d be able to close it once I was inside.

My green nail polish proved to be an interesting contrast.

I’d chosen one of my favorite Cole Porter tunes: IT WAS JUST ONE OF THOSE THINGS. The slightly acid but mainly lighted-hearted lyric goes, “It was just one of those things, just one of those crazy things, a trip to the moon on gossamer wings….” And concludes with a nice cold dose of reality: “If we’d thought a bit of the end of it when we started painting the town, we’d have been aware that our love affair was much too hot not to cool down…”

But who wants to be that aware?

Lawrence and I did a fast and foxy foxtrot, with only a few stumbles on my part. I’m so carried away when I dance that I sing along with the music and hardly know or care where I’m putting my flying feet.

Fortunately, Lawrence has a fabulous lead, and I’m helped after all these years of dancing by something automatic called muscle memory.

There’s something to be said in favor of the part-time dancer.

In New Mexico dancing