the beginnings of ballroom

Started intermediate ballroom tonight. I want to shoot myself in the foot a little bit. During class I had moments where I wanted to claw at my throat, bang my head against a wall, and be mildly violent. Why do these strange needs/desires to inflict pain on myself always occur when I'm starting a new dance class? Maybe the idea of physical pain alleviates the mental cringes and shutterings, it probably also helps to keep my facial expressions neutral. You may think that I'm exaggerating, but I literally had visions of me banging my head against the wall while the whole class was holding hands and stepping sideways to the beat of single, double, single, double.

For an intermediate class, the students are painfully beginners. I had visions of doing a quick review tonight and actually dancing it up with the waltz or chacha. Instead we talked about frame, the leader/follower relationship, timing, etc., etc. I may be wrong, but surely if one is an intermediate dancer than these are concepts that are ingrained and don't need reviewing.

Take a breath, Jen. Maybe it won't be all that bad...Remember last semester? The first several classes were painful, but then you ended up really enjoying it.

I guess part of me is a little disappointed that we're only focusing on salsa, west coast swing, and foxtrot with the possibility of "parisian" tango. Who the heck has ever hear of Parisian tango??? Never in all my dance years have I ever heard of such a term. There's Argentine tango and American tango. Granted, I don't profess to be proficient in any form of ballroom, so I turned to the source of all knowledge: the interweb, er, internet. I googled "parisian tango" and the only things that come up are things that have to do with tango in Paris (surprise, surprise), a dance costume that is labeled by that specific term, and a 1972 Italian film. Next I googled "different styles of tango." I've found an Uruguayan and Finnish style, but no Parisian. I'm now fairly sure that the teacher made that up. I don't appreciate it when dance teachers mess with my head and make up terms that work for them.

Speaking of messing with my head, I apparently have my swing dances all mixed up. What I thought was West Coast Swing is, in fact, not. What I thought was Lindy is actually West Coast Swing. I'm terribly confused. Back in my high school days and Indiana days, swing with a triple step was generally labeled as being West Coast swing. Not until I came to the West Coast was I told that it was Lindy. Heaven help me! I may be able to dance it, but I'll never know what to call it. I guess it's sort of like being told that in one place it's soda, the other places it's pop, and over there it's Coke. Aye ya.

Dance would be so much easier if people would stop talking about it and just dance. No names, just say, "We're going to do this dance," --- and demonstrate the basic. Then everyone would say, "Ah yes! I do know that one after all!" or, "Well, ain't that a cute li'l step. Sure glad we're learnin' that one."

Well, I think I'm done blowing off steam for now. I just need to hold in for three more weeks, three more weeks. I'll tell myself that anytime my claw-shaped hands start to head for my throat.