a camp story: dance with me?

my favorite part of camp, besides the endless sunshine, being on the lake everyday, meeting amazing new people, and growing in my faith, was the dancing.

now, these weren't just any old dances. nope. not like a middle school dance, with boys and girls standing on opposite sides and no one dancing. not like a high school prom where...well, the boys and girls are not on opposite sides and doing what they call dancing. these dances were a beautiful blend of crazy themes, music you can move your feet to, and people dancing like no one was watching. i really took the latter to heart.

anyway, we had four kinds of themed dances: the big kahuna, rodeo roundup, cartoon crazy, and operation. to encourage us to interact with the kids and get them to participate in the dance, counselors weren't allowed to dance with other counselors. no big deal. we just danced in groups in circles.

when a slow dance played, it was necessary to find a partner to two-step with. the girls would raise their hands and boys would ask them to dance. i relished the boys' reaction when, sitting down without any desire to dance, i would stand directly in front of them with my hand in the air. they would pretend not to see me, but i stubbornly stood my ground. they'd begin to feel akward and eventually they'd just get up and walk away. my feelings weren't hurt...it was great entertainment.

what i looked forward to the most, though, were not the games on the side, or the food, or even the dancing so much. i loved when it got to the "ladies' choice" part of the evening.

not surprisingly, girls' feelings tend to get hurt when they have no one to wrap their arms around for a slow dance. therefore, the camp staff developed this brilliant policy of "ladies' choice." either that, or it might have something to do with the unlikiness that very many boys would get the courage to ask a girl to dance. so the hard stuff is left up to the girls, as usual (haha).

ladies' choice meant that i, too, could invite any boy to jive with me. any boy was game, may he be standing on the dance floor with his hand raised, signaling he was available, or standing off to the side with three of his buddies, avoiding eye contact with any female. those boys were my favorite. i'd walk up to their circle; the others saw me coming and ran away, leaving the one looking in my direction, unaware he didn't have the security of his friends. i'd ask him to dance...and he'd sometimes regrettingly accept. within a few seconds of dancing, he would have had enough time to formulate an excuse to leave, such as, "i have to go to the bathroom" or, my favorite, "i'm not wearing a belt" as he tugs at his shorts with one hand and departs.

sometimes i wouldn't even get that far. i'd ask a group of guys if anyone wanted to dance and a boy would shove his friend at me as a scape goat, "he wants to dance." i really felt old when an eleven year old apologetically said, "i kinda want to dance with someone my age."

don't let these stories of rejection mislead you...i managed to get at least half of the boys to dance with me. i loved it because, for the most part, none of them could dance. so i had to lead...teaching them the 'ole two-step. when i thought they had it down, i'd ask them questions. i usually had to repeat it a few times. poor kids. i just know in their heads they were saying one-two-back-one-two-back...then the question would come...back-back-one-back-one-two as they stepped on my feet and got all embarrassed. a girl needs a good twirl at the end of every song, so i made them all twirl me, no matter what it took. i actually had one partner who twirled throughout the song on his own will...now that boy is gonna be a charmer one day.

another boy had the two-step down, so he didn't have any problem answering my questions. its kinda akward to just dance with a strange boy, so i had a question routine to get to know them: whats your name, what cabin are you in, whos your counselor, whats your favorite...naturally, he asked the same questions back to me.

"whats your name?"
"jeannine."
"what cabin are you in?"
"gonzalos."
"whos your counselor?"
"i am the counselor!!"

i felt really young then. it was hilarious. for some reason, no one at camp could figure out how old i was. first term, i was 15. second term, i was 22.

anyway, this summer i learned plenty of new line dances and danced to my heart's content every time.

additional camp stories: 8 legged freaks, the worst day of camp