Oh, the Addiction

Thanks to Reuel leaving for a month, I had the pleasure of teaching a handful of private lessons in his stay. One of the students (I’ll call her Sarah) is new to dancing completely.

Sarah is one of the reasons I love teaching. I’m not usually a big proponent of brand new swing dancers learning in a private setting for a variety of reasons, but since Nashville doesn’t really have any beginner classes available right now I didn’t refer her to a class to start with.

She showed up with all the typical trepidations of a newbie coupled with an utter lack of confidence in her own ability to keep a beat or move her body with any grace.  She claimed to be completely unable to find or keep a rhythm, but she always wanted to learn to dance, and she was finally going to do that.

In contrast to all her worries, she turned out to be a very quick study. She asked smart questions and thought through the basics with keen sophistication I don’t typically see in beginners (or even many more intermediate dancers).

After the 1st lesson I convinced her to go dancing that night with the promise that I would be there and would dance with her and answer any questions she had.  By the time I showed up at the dance (late because I’d been listening to Vanderbilt become bowl eligible for only the 2nd time in my lifetime) Sarah was drenched in sweat and barely had time to dance with me.

We had a follow up lesson a few days later and she showed up all aglow with excitement, jubilation, anticipation, all those feelings that can make one’s eyes twinkle. She was addicted, she loved it, and was desperate to learn more.

Oh if everyone would embrace being a beginner with such abandon.