I dropped my oldest son off today at The Dance Factory, a local place where--for a fee--you can learn how to dance. Many of my son's friends were already involved in the classes and he was asked to join and he did. He takes ballroom dancing lessons once a week.
I envy my son's opportunity, and his willingness to try new things. I think it's impossible not to have children and think back of when we were their age. When I was my son's age the thought of taking a ballroom dance class would have been met with a completely different reaction from that of my son. First I would have been terrified and then to hide the fear, I would have possibly made fun of those in the class. Never to their faces, of course.
But, looking back, I wish I had taken a dance class. There's a lot to learn in such a class and much of it has nothing to do with dancing. My son does a lot of things I wish I would have done. I wonder, if he has the opportunity to have children of his own, if he will look back on his life and think about how things might have turned out different, if only different choices were made. Maybe he won't have as many regrets. We'll see...
It's fantastic your son is into ballroom dancing, and I think it's even better we live in a time it's okay for a dad to be okay with it. :P There's no way we could parent without thinking of our parents or ourselves as kids, I don't think. Regrets will always be there, but more because we don't know what we want until much later and we recognize how much easier it would have been if we had just known that at 9 or 10 or 18.
ReplyDeleteYou should still find a dance class to join. It's not too late. Or you could be like me and live vicariously through the dancers from Dancing With The Stars for an hour each time I watch it.
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