North Shore Dance Society
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Have you done crazy things since you started dancing, or were you always like that? No matter your particular slant, it’s indisputable that some of the stuff we do is absolutely bonkers. Going to a late night event as an adult with a job… on a Wednesday.
We all thought that one day, we’d grow out of the early-adulthood late-nights. Or, perhaps like me, it was never your shtick to begin with…
…Until you started dancing.
For every dancer, there’s at least a few times where we sacrifice a good night’s sleep for a mid-week event. Some of us regret it deeply, others make it a perpetual habit. Regardless, none of us thought it would be something we did when work starts at 9 a.m. the next morning.
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Flying to another city for a 3-day vacation… and never leaving the hotel.
Who flies to another city – especially a foreign one – to sit in a hotel? Dancers!
Gone are the days of sight-seeing vacations. Dancers can fly thousands of miles to happily spend the weekend in a hotel. Sometimes, we don’t even see daylight or get maid service.
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Thinking that an event starts “early” if the first scheduled session is before 11am.
I remember the first time I went to a Salsa congress. My mother thought I was lying when I said the first workshop was at 11 a.m. She was used to professional events, where the day starts at 8:30 a.m. and is over by 9 p.m.
Now, I’m experiencing the reverse. I see professional-developments advertising 7:30 a.m. breakfasts. At some events, that’s when I go to bed. I feel like these people must be mutants, even though these are technically the “normal” people. (Of course, we just call them ‘non-dancers’).
Of course, there was that one event where tech rehearsal was at 8 a.m. Sunday morning. What kind of sadistic organizer schedules tech rehearsal at 8 a.m. on the Sunday of an event???
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Dividing the world into “dancers” and “non-dancers”.
When discussing a new person, what’s the first thing you say about them? For many dancers, the first description we give to others is whether the person is a “dancer” or a “non-dancer.”
Meeting a dancer friend for coffee?
Went on a date? With a non-dancer?
Bringing a friend to the social? Oh, they’re already a dancer?
You get the picture.
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Dancing to a Justin Bieber remix… and loving it.
Baby, baby, baby…. oooooohhhhh….
Yeah. You know you could dance to that jam if you do Zouk, WCS, Hustle, or Sensual Bachata. If you dance a ‘traditional’ style, there’s probably at least one equivalent artist who is a ‘guilty dance pleasure’.
Is it too late now to say sorry?
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Understanding that “Ballroom” isn’t an umbrella term for every dance.
I went WCS dancing at a nightclub with friends once. A bystander asked me if we were dancing Tango.
Outside of the dance world, partnered dancing seems to be generally referred to as ‘Ballroom’. For the ‘educated,’ it may further be divided into ‘Swing’, ‘Salsa/Latin’, and ‘Tango.” Forget even trying to explain Bachata, Zouk, WCS, or Kizomba.
Then, you become a dancer. Ballroom then specifically refers to the ‘Smooth’ dances, while Ballroom Latin refers to the Ballroom versions of ‘Latin’ dances. Swing isn’t just Lindy; it’s an umbrella term for a gazillion dances.
Kizomba and Zouk? How dare you call them ‘Latin’ (Just kidding… mostly).
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Caring about the soles of your footwear.
I worked in a shoe store for 4 years. The only time I’ve ever heard non-dancers discuss the outer sole of a shoe is when buying winter boots.
For dancers, it’s different. If the sole isn’t suede, what is it? Does it spin? What’s the grip like? What kind of floor is it good for? Are these shoes that can be worn outside?
We care a lot about what is on the bottom of our shoes. We even specifically spend time caring for the bottoms of our shoes.
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Discussing the quality of the floor.
Unless you’re buying a house, most people don’t really care about what the floor is made of. That’s why standard hotel ‘dance’floors are almost universally shitty.
Dancers? We want to know exactly what we’re dealing with.
Wood? Is it sprung? How ‘fast’ is it? Is it waxed?
Concrete? What are you thinking??
Carpet? Maybe as a last-resort when the real floor is full.
Tile? Are you trying to cause my joints immense pain?
The “perfect floor” is almost always the best gift you can give a dancer.
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Spending hours on YouTube watching other people dance.
Let’s face it: the only people who spend time watching endless streams of dance videos are dancers. Otherwise, ‘a lot’ would be several million hits – not a few hundred thousand.
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Reading this blog.
If you weren’t a dancer, there’s no way you would have read this far. Just sayin’.
The original article can be found at www.danceplace.com
North Shore Dance Society