January is gone, the new year is old news, and reversion to the status quo is now in full effect. Step off the treadmill, it’ll still be there next January. Dawn and I ended the month with a Salsa dancing lesson. These things happen when you watch documentaries on the making of the movie Dirty Dancing. I know what you’re thinking, “Nobody puts Baby in a corner.”

Ourselves, and about 40 other promising Baby and Johnny’s, were put through the paces, for about two-hours of very beginner Salsa dance lessons by a very good dance instructor.

She was a kindly lady, and the skillful manner in which she deftly conveyed her 30-years of experience and took full command of a room full of left feet, was most impressive. Do not judge her ability as an instructor based upon the ability of the student. Some Salsa students get left behind. The world needs tomato paste too. So it goes.

I think a lot of things, most of which probably don’t very accurately represent reality, but

I would like to think that my Salsa dancing wasn’t too bad. Not Johnny Castle spicy by any means, maybe closer to sugar-free ketchup. Have you tried that stuff? Not good…needs sugar.

On the few brief occasions that I managed to stop staring at my feet and telling them what to do, I glanced up, and I noticed there were many better and a few worse, but most everyone was smiling. Except that one guy. There’s always that one guy. Don’t be that guy.

It appeared that some of the people in the class had done this before, and had just came to show off their Salsa skills. While most of us looked as though we were simultaneously chopping down a Russian Olive tree with a butter knife and stomping out a brush fire, their bodies effortlessly moved in a manner that made me suspect that their bones had become disjointed and their muscles had spontaneously liquefied.

All that Salsa spice seemed well beyond the safety rating of my bodily capabilities. My hips are under enough duress trying to keep my pants up, I can’t ask them for anything more.

Dawn has endured my “free-lance” style of dance interpretation for many years, and often questions the legitimacy of the “A” I received in the Social Dance class I took in college. Her skepticism is not without merit, the same teacher gave me an “A” in Beginning Swimming as well, and I spent most of the semester lying on the bottom of the pool thrashing about wildly.

Woody Allen once said, “Eighty percent of life is showing up.” An 80% is a “B”, I showed up in class every day, the other 10% must have been pity. Show up, show some effort and appreciation, and people just might cut you a little slack when you accidently step on their toes.

It was an enjoyable experience being in and of a crowd, yet alone with the dance partner that has managed my odd and unpredictable steps so well for so many years.

Salsa? Mildly.