Swing

I've felt for quite a while now that I need a hobby. Other than smoking and drinking, of course. My son went away to school two years ago and for the first time in twenty years, I live alone. Which is nice. And quiet. And kinda lonely sometimes.

Since I lost my mother I've kind of adopted one of the ladies I work with as sort of a surrogate mom. She's in her 70's and she's single and active and funny and opinionated and she's not afraid to cuss. She likes to golf and she likes to dance and basically, we're both looking for a man to do stuff with. A few months ago I saw in the local paper that there was going to be a dance at our VFW and we kicked around the idea of going, but it didn't work out for some reason or other.

So today at work she corners me as soon as I get in and says they're having dance lessons at the VFW and she thinks it might be fun....maybe we should check it out. Hmmmm. Five bucks. Men to dance with. What the hell....she says....if it's not fun we just won't go back. So tonight after work, the forty-something and the seventy-something had our first swing dance lesson. And frankly? It was a hoot.

We wound up in the intermediate class....which was intimidating to say the least. Especially since I'm one of those people you see at weddings doing the Electric Slide that turns the wrong way and knocks into people. There were probably 25 couples in a big circle and the instructor would demonstrate what we were supposed to do and we'd run through it a few times. Then she'd call for the ladies to move to the next partner and all us girls would move to the guy on the right. Or was that left??

We danced for an hour with old men and bald men and nice looking men and sweaty men and charming men and quiet men and serious men. But they were all very nice men. I stepped on toes and turned the wrong the way and thought I'd never get it...but we left the VFW sweaty and laughing, and made plans to go back next Monday.

For the beginners class.