#103 What I Did for Love

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If I held a press conference right now, it would sound like this.

Thank-you all for coming. I will keep my remarks brief and I will not be taking questions. I’d like to being by apologizing to my wife for any pain my actions may have caused. It was never my intention to hurt or embarrass her in any way. I admit it was all my fault. I was the one who signed us up for the Ballroom Dancing class.

I should have known better. My gift for dancing is on a par with Britney Spears’ talent for parenting. When I attended high school dances, people who saw me in action rushed to help me in the mistaken belief that I was suffering a massive seizure. The wild way I flailed my arms reinforced their belief, but also kept them from getting close enough to render any actual aid.

Once I was safely past the age of compulsory public dancing, I hung up my shoes and settled in for more sedentary pursuits like unsynchronized channel surfing and free form snacking. These were areas in which I could demonstrate some measure of competence, areas where I could hold my own, areas which wouldn’t make me look like an electrician trying to jerk a screwdriver out of a live electrical socket.

Yet, not long ago, I myself enrolled us in a Ballroom Dance class…..

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Like this excerpt? Want the whole story? Listen to the audio version by clicking the ‘Play’ button at the top of this post.

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NOTES: 

• Want to learn Ballroom Dancing? There’s a great starter site at:
  http://www.ballroomdancers.com/
• Or, if you’re in the United States, you can learn more by joining USA Dance:
  http://usadance.org/.
• In this episode I tossed in a little throwaway joke about playing a pennywhistle in front of the Washington Monument. Listeners who are familiar with the work of the great comic author Herge might have recognized it. Herge was the creator of the incomparable Tintin adventures. Read more at:
  http://tintin.francetv.fr/index.html#home/une.swf&lang=uk/

Tags: humor essay | funny story | dance | ballroom | dance lessons | comedy