Dirty Dancing
Image via Wikipedia
This is not about the movie, but I might as well go ahead and and gripe about it anyway.
Here’s something I’ve always wondered about Dirty Dancing. Daddy hates Johnny for sleeping with Baby. Then Johnny dances with Baby, and Daddy finds out that Creepy (sorry, can’t remember his name, and not worth googling) was the guy who got Penny pregnant. Daddy APOLOGIZES to Johnny. Huh? Just because Johnny can swing Baby over his head, and didn’t actually impregnate someone else, it is OKAY by Daddy for this partially-employed tight-shirted dude to sleep with his teenage daughter? Yeah, my daddy certainly would have felt the same way.
But I digress.
This is about MY dirty dancing. I am a fabulous dancer. In my own mind anyway. Now I’m not talking about the Fox Trot, or Tango, or Dirty Dancing’s Merengue (which I have no idea what that is). I admire ballroom dancing (especially Maksim Cmerkovskiy), but my ability in that form consists of what we used to call “slow-dancing”: moving my feet somewhat while hugging my husband.
No, I am talking about DANCING – hip swaying, pelvis thrusting, boob shaking, rock n roll dancing. I can MOVE!
Just strike up the intro to “Shout” and I’m a sexy, gravity-defying, rhythm genius. I prance, stomp, jiggle my girly parts like the exhibitionist I could never otherwise be.
My husband can’t really dance, and is self-conscious when I drag him to the floor for “Good Lovin'” But I don’t care. Dancing isn’t about him. It’s about ME.
Years ago (I’m thinking the mid-eighties), Chubby Checker performed at a local dinner club.
Image via Wikipedia
He may have been a little past his prime, but he could still triple-time twist. The audience sat at their tables and enjoyed the performance. Not me. I got up from the table and danced my ass off. My boyfriend of the moment appeared mortified. I did not care.
But now I am worried.
The youngest of my adult nephews is getting married. Here he is dancing with me at my wedding twenty years ago.
The wedding is still three months away, but I am already sad. This is the first wedding –and dancing–for me since I have turned the big Six-Oh.
Even in my own fantasy land, I can’t picture a sixty-year-old doing the fanny-wagging necessary to get the absolute most out of Mony Mony.
So I am retiring from the dance floor. I will miss it. My husband will be relieved.
Unless of course, my sister – mother of the groom and older than me – cuts loose. Then all bets are off.
- Posted in: Aging ♦ Humor
- Tagged: Aging, Dance, dancing, Dirty Dancing, fun, Humor, middle-age, weddings
notquiteold 
That you were ever uninhibited enough to stomp, prance and jiggle all your stuff is something to be proud of. Don’t let 60 stop you from being you : )
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You just GO FOR IT!!! Sip a little of the bubbly stuff and then LET LOOSE – you know you want to 🙂
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I may not be able to contain myself.
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Don’t you dare not dance at that wedding! Weddings are about celebration, girlfriend, and celebration is about dance. Who cares if you’re 60? Who cares if people look askance? They’re just jealous that they don’t have the nerve to get up there and shake loose. Go for it!
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Thanks Melissa…. I’ve told myself for years that everyone is jealous of my awesome moves!
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Ha! You’re a rock star. I love it.
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At the wedding of my first daughter I was dancing (by myself) and I really got into it when the rock ‘n’ roll tunes came on. UNTIL I dislocated my hip during a rather complicated step. Did I tell you it was 1:30 a.m.? Recovery period – nine months. Enough said!
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Now THAT is amazingly awful. On the other hand, how fabulous to dance hard enough to dislocate a hip!
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I am stuck on the Dirty Dancing summary. The way I interpreted it, Daddy was angry with Johnny for sleeping with Baby, yes, but he apologized for something else. He had judged Johnnie largely on appearance and social class, making the assumption that Johnnie had not only impregnated someone but had casually sent her for an unsafe abortion that could have killed her. Also, Daddy had openly praised and supported the character you call Creepy, largely based on appearance and social class, who had actually done what he thought Johnnie had done. I don’t think the apology was about the daughter or the dancing so much as it was about integrity and reputation.
I think you should go ahead and dance. Weddings are a time a celebration, not a time to sit in a chair feeling “too old” for the dance floor.
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Don’t you dare! You had better get your booty out there and shake it! Life is too short. If you enjoy and it doesn’t hurt anyone, do it!! Do not let anyone or anything stop you from the joy of dancing. I, too, am a dancing legend (in my own mind), and I will never stop. It is fun, and it is good for you. How many things can you say that about?
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I love your blog. Thanks for finding ME so I could find you. I laughed out loud at your DD summerization. And get back on t hat dance floor, ASAP. 😉
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