A Mennonite on the Dance Floor

Starting dance class from being the most white girl of white girls is terrifying. You feel like a strange cross between Wall-E, pumpkin spice lattes, and Amish. No really, that first dance class is the most awkward you’ve ever felt in your life and it’s tempting to go home and bawl your eyes out because you haven’t felt that uncoordinated since being picked last for a game in 4th grade. The movements are unfamiliar, and you kind of jerk around trying to complete the steps.

But you go back, and back, and back, and gradually start to become familiar with the steps, and the way they are put together, and how to read cues from a partner… and then you brave the first dance social.

Now this is like that first dance class with nerves on steroids. Anyone could be here. The most skilled dancers, polished partners, gorgeous women, and what does one wear to a dance social when the Mennonite socials of childhood were usually work bees and eviscerating chickens?
It’s ok, probably you’ll sit there all night anyway, you console yourself, because no one knows you or will ask you to dance.

But then, someone does! Oh. The nerves! The excitement! A boy asked you to dance! And hey, that was fun. Maybe classes did some good after all. Mistakes happen, yes, but everyone is gracious.

Fast forward 10 months and a handful of socials later, you attend and men are scarce leaving you sitting more than dancing. As you sit, the best dancer of them all comes up and says, “would you like to dance?” and stretches out his hand in the traditional gesture.

“I would love to.”

And so you sweep onto the floor in a breathtaking whirl, twists and spins. It’s almost beyond your skill level but this is more fun than anything you’ve ever done in your life. The tension is right. The moves are synced.

“New move!” he says, before catching you off guard while both of you duck and spin through woven arms.

Then the music stops: a dramatic pause. You both stop two seconds. He looks at your eyes, and you instinctively know that he is cuing for extra footwork. In a split second your right foot and his left extend, and draw back to frame together. The dance continues.

Euphoria. You have only seen this done on polished dance floors, and now have done it with no prior practice, no one has told you how to do this. It is like magic.

The look on his face is sunshine.

The instructor approves.

Truly a golden moment.

L.Raine

Photo by Ralph (Ravi) Kayden