All The Wrong Moves

“So why aren’t you dancing?” I’ve been asked this question dozens of times, so I quickly reply with my rehearsed answer.

“Oh, I wouldn’t want to embarrass everyone on the dance floor.” The girl smiles and accepts my response as an alluring demonstration of my self-confidence before shifting the conversation to another topic.

I honestly worry that I’ll embarrass people on the dance floor. What I don’t tell the inquisitive girls, however, is that other dancers never feel embarrassed because my moves are so far superior to theirs. No, I fear that if I dance I’ll actually emit waves of second-hand embarrassment that will extinguish the flames of even the most blazing parties. The couple dancing passionately in the corner would lose their intensity, their eyes, previously fixated upon one another, suddenly would be unable to stop looking at that giant guy whose body is gyrating like a half-crushed insect.

I learned that I was a terrible dancer at a young age. In 6th grade I began to notice a pattern when girls kept breaking up with me the day after a dance. I even had one girl dump me in the middle of a song. Apparently the final straw came when my left arm, in the middle of it’s own solo dance tour that remained secret from the rest of my body, smacked the poor girl in the face. She broke up with me two minutes later, and I like to think that her tears spawned from the heartbreak of her difficult decision, not from the pain of her broken nose.

There are several reasons why I am an embarrassing dancer. It’s not that I move my body offbeat, it’s just that the beat I dance to is usually from a song that hasn’t been invented yet. You may think that I am exaggerating my futility at dancing, but I’m not. It’s gotten to the point where at clubs I’ll stand in front of the strobe light in hopes that it induces a seizure that would vastly improve my body’s chances of staying on beat. Girls would be impressed with me and my newfound rhythm, or at least until they saw the drool.

I also have a problem with sweating when I dance. It’s usually incredibly hot at crowded clubs and parties, and after only a few minutes of moving around I am drenched. Honestly, I start to worry about my dance partner when I’m sweaty like that. I feel like I should offer her a life vest or something. Sometimes when I’m really soaked I’ll approach a girl at the start of a new song and say, “You must be THIS tall to ride Splash Mountain.” I even make a little hand gesture to demonstrate the required height. Most girls respond with a hand gesture of their own before walking away.

Over the years I’ve discovered that it’s best for everyone if I just don’t dance at all. My abstinence doesn’t prevent me from enjoying a good party –I just prefer to attend as a spectator. Sure, people describe me as “creepy” when I walk into the middle of a crowded dance floor and stand there with a big grin on my face, but it’s better to safe than sorry.