Keepin' up with them Irish

My calves just aren't up to the challenge.

I went to a Ceili (pronounced "kay-lee") on Saturday night. My friend Trudy harassed invited me to go, and it was a blast. The Vancouver Irish Ceili Society puts on a dance once a month with live Irish music and lessons and everything in this little community hall in East Vancouver.

Ceilis are kind of like square dances, but way more fun and are free of the traumatic junior high memories most of us harbour deep within our souls. (I always ended up having to dance with the teacher - how messed up is that?) Sometimes they're done in a great big cirle, somtimes in a line, and even in a triangle. Come to think of it, never once were we in a square. Ok, so they're not really like square dances. But you have a caller and a partner and a "corner." That's about it.

One-two-three-four-five-six-seven, one-two-three, one-two-three! I still can't get that step out of my head!

I went with about four friends, but ended up bumping into a ton of people I knew from elsewhere there, too. Who'da thunk it? The very first person I saw there, other than the lady at the registration table, was one of my students! She's about the cutest thing you ever saw. She's in grade one, has got a GREAT big smile, red hair, is always dressed super colourfully, and LOVES to sing and dance. Last year she sang "I will survive" in front of the whole school for the talent show (680 kids, plus teachers, parents, etc). I heard this bright little voice saying hi to me and I looked down to see Robin's little face grinning at me. She was waving, too, and was kind of excitedly hopping back and forth! Ah! It was SO cute! I offered to be her partner for one of the dances, it was great! All evening she kept pointing me out to her mom and waving at me. Tee hee!

As I looked around the hall, I saw another one of my students there, too! Holy smokes! This was a grade 6 boy, and he saw me too, but I think he was pretty horrified to see me there! As I danced by him I considered teasing him about him being my volunteer to teach these dances to his class on Friday, but I thought I'd spare him the mortification. Muah ha ha!

After the first dance, I also bumped into a friend of mine from high school. What the heck! Apparently these ceilis are the place to be!

I have to say, I thought I wasn't going to like it, but I'm really glad Trudy dragged invited me out!

My calves, on the other hand, are shaking their... um... fists... at her! I guess that's what happens when you spend a whole evening dancing on your tip-toes! Yeowch!