One-two-three-and-off-you-go!

Y'all! I did a NEW THING!!!

Sometimes I forget I'm a grownup and can basically do whatever I want. I got a notion last week to find a way to try something I've always wanted to try, and very quickly found a way to do so. 

On Tuesday night, I took my first ever Irish dance class.

It was delightful. Because of my years of ballet training etc. I'm a quick study, so the learning curve was flatter than it would be for anyone walking in blind--a fact for which I am exceedingly grateful. I managed to learn a decent chunk of a reel in one class. Most of you are looking at that going, "Yeah? So?" Trust me, it's trickier than you'd think, especially when your body keeps trying to do it balletically (yes, I know that's not a real word. It is now.) 

It's certainly a different class atmosphere than I'm used to. Ballet etiquette is as starchy as you'd think it is. You pay attention, don't talk when the instructor is talking, take direction and correction with a 'thank you', and stand nicely to the side when you're waiting for your turn. Oh, and don't take it personally when you get smacked. Now, I have it on authority that the class I experienced wasn't exactly normal. There had been a competition a week or so before, and the lady who runs the school had much wisdom to impart, so there was a great deal more talking in time that would usually be spent dancing. Also, her daughter wasn't there, and apparently the daughter tends to run a much tighter ship, so once she's back I'm sure things will play out a bit differently. That said, the lady who runs the school is THE BUSINESS. She is legit, my friends. Like, smoky-pubs-of-old-Dublin legit. I may be ever so slightly in love with her. I could listen to her talk all day. There's something soothing and homey about the lilt of the Irish accent. But I digress. The point is, this class was mostly-controlled chaos for several reasons, but not all of them had to do with classroom management.

The thing about Irish dance is that you learn sets of steps for different types of music--reels, jigs, hornpipes--and run them together. You just keep building and adding variations until you have something that lasts a whole piece of music. At least, this is the sense I'm getting from one class. I don't think my observation is too far off the mark, though. The class that I'm taking is an adult class, but not-being-children is the thing we have most in common. The range of experience runs from my one class to a literal lifetime, so you can imagine the differences you'd see in one go-round of 'everybody do your reel'. And that's exactly how it's done, by the way. In small groups, everyone cycles through and does their sets a few times, then the tempo changes and they repeat, but with a jig instead of a reel, and on and on.

Now, where does that leave me?

Standing at the back, actually. BUT, I had the good fortune to be adopted by a couple of the proficient dancers and they got me started. It was odd, though. I'm so accustomed to the rigidity of a ballet class, where there is absolute order to everything, and even the less-rigid-but-still-frameworked tap classes I attend that this whole 'just start dancing' thing was a left-field shock. No warm up? No set exercises? Not even a 'we're all going to learn this thing now' section? It was weird, my dudes. Weird. 

But I loved it. I'll be going every week.

And it means I need more dance shoes.

Oh, darn!

Before time

I woke up yesterday morning to the news of the passing of British comedian Sean Lock.

He was 58 years old.

It's a tragic loss. He was an intelligent, clever, funny man. Respected by his colleagues--loved, even, if the social media outpouring of grief is anything to go by, and I believe it is.

Another light snuffed out long before it should have been.

Here's Sean besting fellow comedian Jon Richardson at 'Carrot in a Box', a completely ridiculous game of bluff, not only once, but twice. And a nice tribute of some of his best moments put together by Channel 4.

You're already missed, Sean.

Cancer can eat a veritable smorgasbord of dicks.

[insert party-hat-wearing emoji here]

 A friend of mine celebrated a milestone birthday this week. (I won't call out which one, because they'll flay me alive.)

I tell a lie. Two of my friends celebrated milestone birthdays this week. (Whaddup, P.V.? You're a big kid now!) But as much as I love and adore my darlingest P.V., this has less to do with the birthday and more to do with the friendship. These are two very different friendships, and therein lies my point for the day. So here I'll say I love you, P.V., you're awesome, never stop being you. I'll see you this evening when you pick up your present, because you are a geographically-near friend.

Back to the first friend, who is very much not a geographically-near friend.

I've known this friend for about four years now. We met online through a writing forum. We email each other most days. They live in Canada. We've never actually met in person.

This type of relationship is becoming more and more common thanks to the internet. I've got several cherished friendships with people with whom I've never shared a physical space. It feels like it ought to be odd, but somehow it really isn't. You meet because of a shared interest or a snarky comment and things evolve from there and suddenly there's someone thousands of miles away who knows your favorite song and how you always have to put your right shoe on before your left or it messes up your whole day or who you had a crush on in the second grade even though you've never set foot in the same room. You may never set foot in the same room. It's a possibility. There could be any of a number of reasons for it. Now, I'd like to think that at some point this friend and I will manage to occupy the same space, but considering the current state of worldwide affairs, it likely won't be anytime soon. But it would be delightful.

Does anyone else remember pen pal schemes? No kid these days is going to write to a fellow eight-year-old in Africa because of some global classroom program. (Never mind the fact that the handwritten letter has gone the way of the dodo.) I remember doing a pen pal pair up through the American Girl magazine when I was young. I got paired off with a girl my age in upstate New York or someplace. We probably exchanged six letters before we got bored. I know we sent each other wallet-sized school photos so we'd know what the person receiving our letters looked like. Now it's all online--the pictures and the interaction. Social media is a one-stop shop. Convenient, yes, though you have to admit it takes a great deal of the mystery out of things.

Any old way, my delightful Canadian internet friend has celebrated another revolution, and I am ever so grateful to have them in my life--even though we're only ever at opposite ends of a screen.

Own Your Sh*t

Sorry I left y’all high and dry last week. I did have something drafted, but I ended up a) not really liking it, and b) in a flurry of activity ahead of doing a down-and-back to visit my parents to take care of some Very Important Adult Stuff, so it ended up falling by the wayside. Life, amirite?

On with the show, as it were…

This is definitely going to be me playing choirmaster to a great number of you. The rest of you? Well, pay attention, because you might learn something.

Humans make mistakes. We all do it from time to time. Hell, I fuck shit up all over the place, even when I’m trying really hard not to. It’s just a thing that happens. Is it fun? No. Do we like doing it? No. But, like death and taxes, it is an inevitability. At some point or another, we are going to screw something up to some degree. It might be slight, it might be drastic, it might be somewhere in between—but it’s going to happen. When it does, you have two* options.

Option one, you find a scapegoat. Pass the buck. Lay the blame everywhere but where it actually sits. Make excuses. Curse the world, or technology, or your cubicle neighbor for talking too loudly on a conference call. Basically, you claim innocence, even though the evidence is against you. This option is the favorite of those who feel they can do no wrong. We all know at least one person in this camp. Nothing is ever their fault (even when it clearly is). They love to point fingers. You want to buy them a shovel for Christmas to help them along with the holes they like to dig for themselves.

Option two, you OWN YOUR SHIT. Acknowledge the mistake, make the appropriate apologies, fix the issue, and move on.

Now, nobody likes to be wrong. Nobody likes to be told, “Hey, you screwed this up.” But it’s a fact of life, and the sooner you learn to deal with it gracefully, the better. The other party/ies involved will appreciate your candor far more than having to listen to you blame everything down to the leftover enchilada you ate last Tuesday that messed with your insides for twenty-four hours. Trust me. I was not one of natures little owner-uppers until a decent way into my twenties. I had to force myself to change how I reacted when something I did didn’t work out the way it was supposed to. There was a significant learning curve. It took time, and a lot of deep breathing, but I managed it.

Of course, as I am wont to do, I really just tipped everything over in the opposite direction and now operate under the assumption that everything I touch will automatically turn to shit, and if something is broken, it’s my fault. (Even when I have nothing to do with it.)

I’m rabbiting on about this in the spirit of good fellowship. Perhaps you’ll realize that you can do better. Perhaps you’re already good at this but know someone who would benefit from a change of perspective.

Why are we talking about this? I may or may not have had to deal with a blamer this week. Now go forth and heed my words, peasants!



*There is, technically, an option three, which is the ‘little white lie’. This is perfectly acceptable in instances of small mistakes where you can blame things like gremlins in the system because you know it’s easier to appease the person you’re talking to that way. Most of us employ this—don’t pretend you don’t. But it’s only a good idea when you know you can get away with it.

“Did you get my email?”

::stares at email at bottom of inbox where it has been for three days because you didn’t want to deal with it:: “Oh, no! It must have got caught in my spam filter! No, wait, here it is. I’m so sorry, I filed it in the wrong place by mistake. Let’s take a look.”

You know, that kind of thing. Harmless.