Can’t feel no pavement right under my feet

I went to my first salsa class tonight. I’ve wanted to do something dance-like again for a long time, but what with my ridiculously changeable work schedule – OK, and a fair bit of the fact that I wasn’t willing to put on my big girl pants and step out of my comfort zone – I just hadn’t done it.

With the new job, and the fact that at twenty-seven years old I really ought to be willing to do something like dance All By Myself, I found a salsa class. The eight-week beginner’s class? Started today. My birthday was yesterday. It seemed like the right kind of omen, so I signed up, paid in advance, and did the first class tonight. It was fun!

There was the predictable mix of couples, unattached females, and one wannabe lothario present. He didn’t quite fit the mold, in that he actually possessed a chin and appeared to be of Asian descent, but still.

I had fun, in a mildly malcoordinated I-wish-I’d-left-my-high-heels-on kind of way. Also predictably, I failed to catch signals from men trying to lead me – I get insistent on staying in time and forget that women are supposed to follow their partner’s lead, but by the end of the class I’d more or less gotten over myself.

It’s funny, I’ve gotten to the age of 27 and still periodically discover a way in which I have unexpectedly grown up, or gained confidence, or whatever. A month or so ago I was in a foodcourt, couldn’t find an empty table, and marched up to a chap eating by himself, plonked down at the table (politely, with a “d’you mind?”) and proceeded to eat my lunch. I wouldn’t have done that a few years back. No confidence.

Funny the things that change.

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