City living? No thanks

Cities are filthy. Yuck!

Having grown up in Queens, this isn't exactly news to me. But I was reminded of it on Friday night in a bad, bad way. I went dancing with Salsa Man to Havana Club in Cambridge, which was enough fun. (It was nice to be able to be held a little closer. I’m about 17 pounds down, if I count from when I last saw the doc, but I’m 15 pounds down, according to Wii Fit.) Although I got lost on the way in (so what else is new?), I blundered my way through Boston, Brighton, and Allston, and met up with him only about 15 minutes late. We parked in the same (free, yay!) parking lot as last time, and walked a few blocks to the club. I didn’t want to ruin my dancing shoes, so I changed into them when I got there, and wore flip flops in the street. It's relevant to the story.

We warmed up during the first class section, then he went to the beginner class and I decided to stick with intermediate. The instructor assumed we knew what we were doing, and we did, for the most part. Although I did the single steps correctly, I had a little more trouble when we moved to partner work. But I did all right, and was able to pick it up eventually.

Do you remember about a month ago when I became so frustrated with myself when I couldn’t get any of the steps during a Thursday class? This was one of them. I figured out what I was doing wrong: one, I wasn’t turning far enough on the outside turn (you have to turn to face your partner completely with your body, keeping both hands behind your back. For some reason I thought it was a 3/4 turn); and two, I wasn’t waiting long enough (wasn't allowing the leader to count the right beat) before returning to the basic position. I still find that step tricky, but I was able to decently pick up another combination involving crossed arms with your partner and an interesting back step on the left foot. A little over an hour in, Salsa Man announced that he wanted to make it an earlier night than last time. Ok, fine by me. 45 minutes later we were both rather sweaty and we took off. I drove home on I93, where I sat in traffic for far too long (construction). By then, I was tired and had a stuffy nose.

After enjoying a hot shower with my trusty mesh scrubby and Freshwater Cucumber shower gel (yum), my nose was still a little clogged. So I blew it. And out came lots of dirt, or smog, or dust, or city gunk, or whatever the heck it was! Ew. Not for nothing, but I was there for slightly over two hours, maybe 20 minutes of which was outside. The amount of filth I had sucked into my nostrils was revolting. It was just wrong. And my feet! They had been less than an inch away from the street. Eek! Who knows what they could have come into contact with!

Long story short, although nice to visit, I don’t actually miss living in a city-type environment. If, however, I were for some reason forced to choose, I could probably have quite a decent life in Portland, ME...