So we’re all set to go to a Quinceanera, a 15th birthday party for the daughter of good friends, and a few days before the big bash, my hubby has an emergency at his job and can’t make the event.
Fine, I said, but won’t you be sorry when some handsome guy sweeps me off my feet while I’m at the party all by my lonesome.
He laughed, but wouldn’t you just know it, it was at the Quinceanera where I unexpectedly met Sam.
There I was, sitting at the party at a table with friends, polishing off my dinner, when the DJ made an announcement: “OK, young people, let’s get some of the adults up dancing. Now each of you go and grab an old person and bring them out on the dance floor.”
I was barely listening to his instructions as I swallowed another mouthful of chicken and then I felt it: A tap on my shoulder.
When I looked up, there was Sam, all five feet of him, wearing nice khaki pants, a button-down shirt and a necktie wrapped around his forehead, Woodstock-style.
“Would you like to dance?” he asked as I almost choked on my daily allotment of protein.
“Uh, sure,” I mumbled as Sam bent his arm to escort me out onto the floor.
Some of my shock was leftover PTSD as Girl-Least-Likely-To-Be-Asked-To-Disco in high school. In fact, I don’t think I was ever asked to dance in my teen years, except by my sister’s boyfriend and then strictly as a “sympathy dance.”
And for all I knew, maybe my status hadn’t changed much through the years and Sam’s young pals had instructed him to select the dowdiest, most pitiful old person at the party (you know, the theme in many a teen movie) and I was the winner.
But I didn’t care. All I knew was the hubby had ditched me for work and the utterly adorable Sam the Man was now my dance partner.
And let me tell you, he was something. What he lacked in height, he compensated for in rhythm and enthusiasm. The boy had an unabashed style, I tell ya.
In fact, the whole group of 14/15-year-olds filled the dance floor and moved the entire night like a large human scrum of jumping feet and waving arms.
When I was young (don’t you hate it when people start out a story that way?), the dance floor consisted mostly of girls and a handful of suave boys who knew how to work a Motown song to their advantage. The rest of the guys literally stood on the sidelines, hands in their pockets, looking glum and useless and self-conscious.
But these kids didn’t need a partner or a specific dance step, they just moved up and down like a happy throng to Beyonce and Lady GaGa, not caring a bit what anyone looked like while they were dancing or even, God Forbid, if they were old.
When I was raving about Sam’s bravery later that evening, my host noted the fact that the esteemed object of my attention also wore a tie around his head.
But I didn’t care. Truth was, I didn’t even notice that his used his necktie as a fashion accoutrement. No, it wasn’t love being blind, it was amazement that a kid so young had the courage to even approach an older person whom he didn’t even know. I certainly wouldn’t have had the guts to do it at his age.
Of course, he found other girls his age and I only had one dance with Sam, but as the party ended, I bumped into him and told him that he was an excellent dancer. He smiled and semi-kiddingly mentioned that he practiced a lot. I wasn’t surprised.
With his work ethic and unrestrained natural charm, let me tell you, that kid’s gonna go places.
And the next time my beloved bails on a social obligation, I’ll attend solo and hope that the universe has another chivalrous Sam just waiting to cut some rug with an old girl. Why? Cause life and a Quiceanera are like a box of chocolates – you never, ever know what you’re gonna get…or with whom you’re going to end up twisting the night away.
BonesBlog 