one and two

I.

Swept onto the dance floor by a long fellow, a colleague about two meters tall, who can't dance, by his own admission, but is enthusiastic, and he tells me, leaning down to get my ear, that it had been really funny at dinner. I don't understand: how's that? Well, he says, when I had gone by his table and said hello first to him and then to the fellow next to him, the chap had been totally tongue-tied, utterly incapable of speech in my presence. What? and I laugh. My dancing partner goes on: he had made a little fun of his dining companion once I had walked away, and the man had been utterly mortified; I'd spoken to him and he had experienced complete vapor lock: "I just took one look at her and knew that I was going to say something appallingly stupid" - so he just clamped his jaw shut and felt ridiculous. So says my dancing partner and swings me around.

I remember I laughed. I threw my head back and laughed, and it was very agreeable to dance -even badly- with a very tall man whom I did not know well or care much about and laugh, leaning away from him, with my head thrown back.


II.

I used to think I followed well. This may well have been a misconception from the start, but I cannot be certain. Certainly I do not follow well any longer. I have strange notions about where my feet should be, and I skip about in ways sure to vex all involved. I can catch myself on my heel well enough, avoid tipping ass-over-tea-kettle into some other couple on a backward-going promenade. But when my dancing partner steps back himself, I stumble forward into the void.