Move Over Fred Astaire!

Wednesday night Jason met me at the highschool where our dancing lessons are taking place with a contorted face that looked like a cross between a deer caught in the headlights and a person getting ready to go for a root canal. It was kind of pitiful....I felt a little bad...I actually thought about telling him we didn't have to do it...naaaahhhh! This opportunity would surely never arise again. He was here, and...er...willing. Carpe Diem baby!

You could tell that nervousness was growing in him as each second passed and he watched the previous class finish up. But alas, and amazing thing happened...you might even say wondrous! The lesson got under way and the instructor began with teaching the guys only. As she went through the basic swing step of slow-slow-backstep-slow-slow-backstep, a clear frontrunner emerged out of the 5 fumbling, waddling, rocking men.....and it was MY husband! Sure he was stiffer than a 6 foot pine board and he is incababple of moving his lower body independently of his upper body, but he was keeping up with the instructor, stepping with the correct feet and able to increase in speed as she did while the other men essential fell all over thesmeselves.

When the women joined the mix, I was the clear frontrunner as well. (It must be due to that tap and ballet I took in the third grade and always quit before the final show.) I'll admit, there is a spunky, curly haired woman that's not bad herself and nippin' at my heals to take over as best female dancer of the adult ed beginners class. I'll have to do some serious practice this week to fend her off, but if I do, I'm confident I can stay one step ahead of her! (Pun intended! And if you haven't noticed yet...I'm a competative person. I have a clear need to be the best at everything I do and WILL find a way to turn pretty much anything into a competition inside my own twisted little mind.)

And when we finally got to dance together! WATCH OUT GINGER ROGERS AND FRED ASTAIRE! Here we come! Sure it takes Jason 5 minutes to find the beat in the song and he has to concentrate so hard to keep it that he looks like he's constipated all the time...but I wait for him to lead....and bi-golly when he finally puts that left foot forward we're off and runnin'!

The teacher saw that she clearly had some stand outs and had to move the class into two groups. (She told the slow group not to feel bad and that everybody moves at their own pace, but we all know that she's just being nice!) It was us and this other couple (the one with the cute lady that's threatening my dancing status) that got put in the advanced group. (The teacher did not call it the advanced group, but I do.) She taught us women how to do a spin and the guys how to send us out. And then she taught us a return! And then we did a double return! And then Jason spun at the same time that I did when we were doing the return (which was a clear result of utter confusion and had nothing to do with trying new moves or attempting to spice it up) But apparently it turned out to be a really advanced move and she told him to slow down, because he was like 4 steps ahead of her! Oh! Music to my ears! The instructor even used Jason as an example (the good kind) once and she used me as an example MULTIPLE times! Yeah, the other people in the class may end up hating us and dropping out because of sheer frusration, but it sure is boosting my self-esteem up like 1,000 notches! And we still have 6 more weeks! My head will be so big I'll be floating like a hot air balloon!

But in all seriousness. It went really well. Jason said he had a much better time that he ever expected and was quite pleased with how well he did. We went into it expecting to be the worst and being fine with that and were pleasently suprised by how good we were. Jason and I were laughing and smiling and hugging through the whole thing. It gave me lots of opportunities to tell him how good he was doing and how proud of him I was and we left feeling more connected than I think we have in a while...plus it's great excercize and a super stress reliever! We had a blast. Y'all should try it!