Dancing All Day and All Night?

Dancing started this morning at 8:30 a.m. and ended tonight at 11:00 p.m. Of course we had breaks for lunch and dinner, but all in all it was a lot of dancing for one day! We enjoyed the opportunity to dance to some of our favorite callers.

Lee Kopman called the first session in the C-1 hall this morning, billed as an introduction to the next level of dancing (in our case, that's C-2). He taught two calls. The first, Sets in Motion, is one that he wrote (of course he wrote most of the calls in modern square dancing, I think). Lee taught us Sets in Motion last year at this weekend, but of course we had entirely forgotten it. If you don't dance a call, it doesn't get imprinted on the brain/body. We are hoping to take C-2 lessons this winter in the RGV, so we'll be expected to actually remember this stuff! Lee also tossed in a brief but very versatile call, Bounce.

Lee at computer

C-2 dancers (we're hoping to join them next year)

This evening we joined a group going to Ta Molly's Mexican Restaurant for dinner. At our table we had Glenn and Char, Marty and Kit, Hardy and Judy, Decah Lipscomb, and another couple we didn't catch the names of. It was a lively group, and I think we all enjoyed the food. Ken and I split the Baja Fish Tacos.

This evening's dancing was great. Some of the C-2 dancers actually came over to dance with us, so we had four squares part of the time. The dancing was challenging (of course) and the choreography interesting. As always we were glad to see Joe Saltel and Darryl Lipscomb, two callers who winter in the RGV, so we get to dance to them regularly (lucky us). We also very much enjoy Bill Haynes and Tim Ploch--and of course the "Square Dance Man" himself, Lee Kopman.

One thing that makes the fair grounds in Paris not the best for this kind of weekend is that the venues for the various levels are so far spread apart. This causes two problems: one is that the dancers can't easily slip from one hall to another to dance with their friends who are dancing at another level. Another, and in my mind more serious issue is that it takes the callers quite a while to move from one hall to another, which definitely cuts into the dance time. This problem is exacerbated when the callers are assigned to call for only half an hour at a time. Even with these issues, the weekend is a great time that we really enjoy a lot.