Dance Like Everyone is Watching
After a brief foray into dance during my single digit years, I gave up on being a graceful ballerina and leaned into dancing in ways my body could do with the least amount of effort and skill. No shade to dancers because those moves and level of coordination are hard. Whereas, I usually loved to be defined and restricted with rules about what to do and more importantly what NOT to do; dance seemed above that, more pure. I admire dancers and their graceful ways from afar wondering if that could have been me if I had stuck with the leotards and tights.
I would say I fall into the comfortable middle ground of dancing. I'm not terrible or the worst, cue Elaine from Seinfeld dance moves, but not swinging around in a coordinated routine either. In general, I know how to move from choreography in high school choir, so many jazz hands, and flopping and flailing around my room to my favorite body moving music. Dancing well seems like a secret talent that, for non dancers, there are few places to show it off except for one; wedding receptions.
I didn't have dancing at my wedding reception although any floor can be a dance floor. It was a tradition we didn't mind scrapping because of our combined lack of interest in awkward formal dancing in front of an audience. I cared more about the food then dancing so my decision was made. Also dancing in a wedding dress might look fun but since it can be hard to walk feeling unencumbered I was sure dancing would be out of the question besides the slow swaying required for the first dances.
When I'm a wedding guest I will be dancing it is just a matter of when. This is contingent on the correct combination of alcohol consumed, songs being played and if my feet hurt from my shoes. On Saturday night all these factors combined into the universe signalling me the time to dance was nigh. It was one of the few rock songs played that night so I leapt at the chance, not metaphorically. My table, mostly filled with family members, aren't really the hard rocking or partying type so I knew they wouldn't be dancing any time soon. But I had control over my own destiny now. I even had a reluctant partner to drag out on any dancing whims I had.
Rainbow lights circled the dance floor the siren song of a good time to be had. To provide encouragement the male half of another couple who were dancing for almost every song gave Julian a high five. Anything can happen on the dance floor! Even though I knew he would feel embarrassed the best place to feel embarrassed and unencumbered is on the wedding reception dance floor. Most people aren't watching, maybe a cursory glance or two, and the amount of fun you are having negates any lack of skill or timing you might exhibit. No dancing FOMO for us. We lasted for one song but that was enough.
I told him later the next day that was my favorite part of the whole wedding, sorry vows, and he begrudgingly admitted it was also his favorite after further prodding. Maybe because there are so few times to really let loose on the dance floor in a semi public and yet private space beyond clubs. I'm sure this doesn't even clock in the top ten of embarrassing things I've done in front of my family and even had people congratulating me on my moves. Were they totally sincere? Probably not. What they were really congratulating me on was having more courage than them, no one else sharing my last name danced, to possibly make a fool out of myself but also have fun.
