I LOVED it. My favorites were the Cha-cha and Swing. He always started with the same song for swing, and as soon as I recognized those first few notes, a huge goofy smile would light up my entire face, and stay plastered there for the duration of the session.
I was good at it, too. Dimitri said I had potential. And I believed him. I learned the entire first syllabus, and then I had to stop because life in general got in the way. School got tough, or work became demanding or money turned scarce. Some stupid reason.
Shortly after I finished college, I discovered I did not want to do desk work. I had taken a job for a non-profit company, where my title and pay was "administrative assistant" but my actual work was "web page and database administrator." It was a small company, and the staff consisted of myself and 2 other ladies- both significantly older than me, and both total wenches.
It took almost a year, but I finally realized that they were taking complete advantage of my young naivety, and were treating me like crap. So I quit. And I followed my heart and applied to become a ballroom dance instructor for Arthur Murray.
I studied with them for a few months, relearning all the moves I'd forgotten, and learning how to teach them to others. I learned how to lead, and how to teach both men and women their respective parts. I student taught and learned how to rack up sufficient clientele. I was doing something I loved, and something I was good at, and it was awesome.
I was offered the job, but sadly couldn't accept it, because they sprung a contract on me that stated that if I were to ever leave Arthur Murray, then I couldn't teach within 25 miles of any Arthur Murray studio for a year or two (I can't remember which). This worried me, along with the fact that I was signing a contract in general- what if there was a huge economic crisis (do those happen?) and people stopped taking dance lessons, but I was still stuck in my contract? What if I never got more than 3 students?
Granted, I was still in my very early 20's, but I had bills to pay! I couldn't rely on the questionable salary and no benefits Arthur Murray was offering, so I had to go somewhere else.
Since then, ballroom dancing has always had a special place in my heart, but the only exposure I get to it is at TB's gigs. So I was very excited to get to go to the Swing Dance event last weekend, especially since LPP was there and he's an awesome dancer.
I danced with maybe 15 guys that night. And they weren't all old and smelly! None were smelly and one was kind of old, but the rest were young and cute. And they were all good dancers. It was a GREAT night. The only bad dancer I got was this funny looking skinny guy with dark hair and a big head. He knew the moves, and he was an ok lead, but he was kind of weird.
I understand the importance of being a strong lead. As a guy, it's your responsibility to cue your partner of what you intend on doing, so she can follow without hesitation. So, for example, when you are ready to turn your partner, you push her hand off with your hand, kind of forcefully, so she knows to separate from you, and do her turn. I'm not saying throw her across the room, but some force is good in this situation. Hence, a strong lead. And there's nothing sexier than a guy who is a confident dancer and a good, strong lead.
This guy had some kind of dominatrix problem. Instead of confidently but gently pushing me away for my turns, he shoved. Hard. Then kind of kept his hand, limp, up in the air. He was all like, "Be gone, bitch." I didn't like it. It felt like he was sick of me all of a sudden, so he pushed me away, but then he'd hold his hand out for me once I completed the turn, so we could continue dancing.
Not sexy.
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