Dirty dancing

"So how is this?" I looked at Roz and Roz looked at me and smiled with the sort of pained look that one gets when you've tried and tried to teach someone something but they just don't get it.

"You're not on the downbeat," she said.

Downbeat? What downbeat?

She stopped me.

"Don't you hear that? The bass in the background … and a one-two-three-four-five-six … and a one-two-three-four-five-six," she said, and then she started clapping her hands.

Downbeat? All I could hear was Kenny Rogers singing about his loose heel. You know the song: You picked a fine time to leave me loose heel. With four hungry children and crops in the fields…

Why is Kenny complaining about his shoes at a time like this? I know, I know, lame joke.

But seriously, all I could really hear was Kenny singing about Lucille and, of course, the whimper.

The whimper was coming from my wife. I kept stepping on her.

"Not such big steps," Roz said.

"Yeah, but the one step is supposed to be a big step," I said.

"You're not jumping a puddle," Roz said. "You're dancing with your wife."

Well, it was dancing in only the loosest of terms. I was making steps to my own little drummer, and my wife was trying like hell to stay out of the way.

Welcome to the wonderful world of ballroom dancing, or, as my wife liked to call it, bawlroom dancing, because my lousy rhythm left her in tears.

Hey, don't look at me that way. It was her idea. She circled the class in the book and left it on the table and took my grunt as an OK. Next thing I know, I'm in the cafeteria at Flathead Valley Community College trying to learn a step named after some guy named Cotton eyed Joe. Or was it Jim? I forget.

Roz was our teacher, a pleasant patient tutor who smiled at my jokes as I tried my best to step on her feet. It wasn't actually ballroom dancing per se. Since there are pretty much no places that do real ballroom dancing in the Flathead Valley, we were learning Western ballroom dancing, which you can do at select drinking establishments in nearly every town from here to Miles City.

I'm on class number five with one more to go. So far, most of the class has learned how to twirl and twist and turn their partners to the beat of pleasant Western music.

I have learned how to take my wife over to the pop machine using the basic step and if we're lucky, I can turn her around and take her back over to the garbage on the other side of the room.

Oh sure, laugh. It's a long journey my friend. Just ask my wife. She says you really got to watch your step when you're with me.

One, two, three … four, five, six …ouch! One, two, three … four, five, six…

Chris Peterson is the editor of the Hungry Horse News.