Yesterday for Valentine's day, I started off without my sweetheart who was out with the boy scouts camping in the cold. I took my kids and went visiting teaching. It was a nice visit and I wondered what to do with the rest of my day. There was a stake dance for adults last night, but I wasn't sure if I was up to dancing or not and I had been wanting to take a trip to Bryan to see my friend in the hospital with her new baby.
Jhonny finally came home and we decided to try and go to the dance. After all we enjoy dancing and it included dinner on the stake - hmm - free date! No brainer. So we dressed up, got a babysitter and headed to Austin - fashionably late because Jhonny had to finish cleaning our house for the babysitter. (Priorities!?!)
When we walked in, we were lucky to find seats at a table because it was packed. We were also last in line for food, but not to worry - there was plenty. Loaves and fishes in the form of Chicken Fajitas, Rice and Boracho Beans (minus real beer). The cultural hall was dressed in red helium heart balloons, valentine decor and more than one baby carseat with infants in tow. It was all reminiscent of by gone days back when I was single (minus babyseats/infants that were a stark contrast) and wondering if there would be any special attention at this single awareness holiday party that I pretty much dreaded year after year. Only somehow this was better.
Better perhaps because I already had my sweetheart at my side. I was already guaranteed a dance partner for every song I wanted to dance to and special attention at my beck and call. How nice to know I didn't have to make the rounds and wonder which available guy would ask me to dance. Ugh! No - these were the days I dreamed of back then. So how nice to be in a place at last where all the dreams can come true. Ahh, it made all the superficial stuff just a bit more romantic. . . and so much less annoying. I could get used to this holiday in my later years.
There was a floor show from former BYU backup ballroom dance team members that was humorous and entertaining. Then an hour of dancing to our favorite requests from decades past. Of course they had to include the macarena, electric slide and cottoneyed joe - former youth dance numbers guaranteed to get everyone on the dance floor not because they are especially fun as much as they took the pressure off of trying to find someone to dance with so you didn't look soo desperate.
From the looks of it, there were more than one former BYU backup dance team members in attendance. Of course our favorite numbers came on with the merenge and salsa numbers requested just so Jhonny could show off his expertise in his specialties.
We had vowed to leave sooner, but we were having too much fun so we ended up staying til the bitter end and helped clean up afterwards. It was during this cleanup effort that I saw a familiar face. She came to me and asked if I had taken a modern dance class at BYU - of course! Then I realized it was my partner from our dance performance for our teacher's graduate dance showcase. We reminisced about our experience back then and tried to remember some of the dance that had us staring at each other's faces and mirroring each other's moves to improvisational music on a dulcimer characteristic of a culture from India.
She informed me that she had just returned from India 6 months ago. Wow! What are the coincidences that we should run into each other 12 years later and here we are serving in callings for "seasoned" sisters in the Relief Society. Fortunately she is the one I've been needing to talk to about some things. Ha! Nice and feeling old. Where did the time go?
I tried to think about perpectives and realizing that my friends from decades past probably don't look so much like they used to back when we were in our prime. What a blow to realize I'm getting older. We're getting older, more wrinkly, more gray, and hopefully more wise.
But then - this is definitely better. So even though the youth have all the rights to goofy dance or date invitations and are excused for being less than dignified in getting down to the latest top 40 hit or line dance, I wouldn't trade my years of wisdom to go back to that. Oh NO! Happy am I to have found my mate already even if that means we only get to go to a dance once a decade instead of bi-monthly.
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