"Off" Night of a Salsera

I've been MIA for a while because I'm now officially dealing with a crisis. Of course, I first successfully created the crisis. In the beginning of the week I devoured Jane Eyre. I've never read it in English, and was pleasantly surprised to find it an easy read that pulls you in until the very last word. I soon found myself buried in a pile of work bigger than Manhattan, and the rest of the week was spent plowing through e-mails, and exterminating immediate fires on my desk. Going out Salsa dancing really late on a Thursday isn't helping my progress any. But since I can't possibly concentrate on anything I HAVE to do while functioning on four hours of sleep, I figured might as well do something I DON'T have to do, and write. Maybe it'll wake me up and stir the creative juices required for a million hours of excel work awaiting me.

The saddest thing is that getting little sleep wasn't worth it, because yesterday I officially had an "off" night. The follows who've had one will commiserate, and the ones who haven't will be grateful once they hit it, because they'll know that they're not the only ones who've had to deal with one. (I don't know if leads have "off" nights. Do they?) "Off" nights can happen at any time during Salsera's career as a follow, and there is no telling when they'll occur or how to prevent them from happening. In case you are wondering: an "off" night is when everything that you can possibly imagine goes wrong. And it never gets better. Although I should've been smarter yesterday, and left before it got worse.

It all started the night before, when I realized that I don't have an outfit planned out. Usually I can visualize exactly what I'll be wearing for the dance. Not this time. In the morning I found myself staring at my closet, absolutely stupefied by its contents. I ended up throwing five or six random items in a bag, and heading off to work (not much time for trying things on in the morning...)

When I got to Salsa, I did a very brave (and stupid) thing and asked to dance with a lead whom I just met, but have been observing for a while and saw that he's phenomenal. Follows... It's just not wise to do that for your first dance. The excitement of the floor, combined with a realization that I'm starving, made me feel lightheaded, and lose my concentration. As soon as I gained it back for a moment, it hit me that my heels are way overdue for a visit to the shoe doctor. So in addition to being hungry and generally lost, I was also wobbly and unstable. Way to make a first impression.

The night continued in this fashion. The usually talkative DJ was at his unusual vivacity and didn't shut up for even a second the entire night. The rare good songs were ruined by the horrible leads that asked me for them. My usual comfy leads were nowhere to be found or somehow missed me (I do have a tendency to travel a bit much...). My current Salsa "crush" (they come and go) broke my heart by leaving early with an extra-large woman of questionable fashion sense. Hence I didn’t get a single dance in with him. As to make up for that, the scary creep whom I was trying to avoid successfully found me in the darkest corner of the ballroom and asked to dance. The only two leads who were actually good managed to invite me for the shortest songs.

I did have a break when an atypical set of circumstances made me dance with a perfect lead from class for three songs in a row. But of course, I couldn't keep him glued to myself the entire night. The rest of the guys were an epitome of my worst nightmare. I'm anal about starting AND CONTINUING on the right beat. Doesn't matter if it's on one or on two (although I don't really have that much experience starting on two.) I consider counting to be my biggest strength in Salsa, and I've never had to concentrate on getting it right. The rhythm is just IN me. The majority of the leads I danced with yesterday started on one, but continued on one, two, three, five, AND seven! As my friend Juliet wisely put it... "following a lead who isn't following the beat is like following a husband who isn't following God". It's hard!

The cherry on the top was the last dance. The gentleman who asked me evoked a vague feeling of alarm, but I couldn't quite remember why exactly I didn't want to dance with him. So I said yes. He was a good lead, except for the fact that most of the time he stared at my chest (Do you see a pattern here guys? Stop doing it!), and when he did look in my eyes it was with that nasty, perverted, piercing glare. I was about to get excited when a lead dancing next to us tapped him on the shoulder and made him switch partners (extremely unconventional practice) because I figured I'm now safe from Sir Stares-A-Lot. Turns out the guy was completely wasted, and as soon as I let go of him, he'd kind of slide backward, almost hitting the oblivious innocent bydancers. Luckily the song ended pretty fast. But talk about humiliation!

But the good news is that very soon (keeping fingers crossed) I won't have to endure an hour-long commute after nights like this. If all goes well, I'll be moving to the city within a month. But now it's time for me to return to extinguishing office fires and wrestling with excel.