Saturday, January 13, 2007

Dance Class

The Goose has dance class every Saturday morning. The Rascal usually stays home with her father while I accompany The Goose to dance class. I sit with the other mothers in the waiting area outside the dance studio, peering through the wall of two way mirrors, admiring our four and five year old ballerinas. The conversation and atmosphere in the waiting area is exactly as you imagine it to be, it’s a coffee clique; a bunch of women feigning social niceties in order to not so subtly brag about their little darlings. The underlying competitiveness and insecurities are palpable. It is an uncomfortable situation to sit through every Saturday morning. I don’t like to be there, but The Goose likes her class and it’s good for her to participate and learn to appreciate beautiful music and dance.

Today, my husband had to work. I had to bring The Rascal along to wait with me while her sister danced. Boy did this kid make waiting fun. She was not the least bit interested in sitting among the members of the coffee clique. As a matter of fact, she was not the least bit interested in sitting at all. She climbed the stairs to the upper dance studio four times. Two ascents were on hands and knees and two were standing while I held her hands and she practiced bending those knees and lifting those feet way up high. The four descents where on hands and knees and belly as she wiggled and squiggled her way down the stairs backwards. She emptied and repacked the bag of toys I brought for her to quietly play with a total of three times. During every unpacking, each toy was greeted with a very loud, joyful squeal, and during every repacking, each toy was shown the sign for “all done”. She observed the ballerinas and applauded enthusiastically. She waived hello to the members of the coffee clique, pointed to the ballerinas, giggled and signed “dance”.

I was happy not to be sitting with the coffee clique today. The Rascal showed me how to have fun in the waiting area.

Life’s too short to sit around and pretend to be nice. You’ll be much happier if you use that time for a good belly slide down the stairwell.

2 comments:

Kelly said...

Ah, the coffee clique. I sat in one during skating lessons at the rink. It was too cold to belly slide down the concrete stairs though.
Congrats on your brand new blog! I hope you don't mind me linking.

Yankee said...

Thanks Kelly. You are my very first comment and my very first link. This entitles you to a door prize!