Monday, February 6, 2012

You are Never Too Old to Dance!

Florida Grande has a Happy Hour every Friday night with a potluck on the first Friday of the month. If your name starts with the letters A-F, you bring a main dish. If you are the middle of the alphabet, you bring a side dish or salad. If you are the end third of the alphabet, you bring dessert. They rotate the responsibilities each month. It seems to work really well! We had entertainment last night, and that just added to the fun.

A guy named Randy comes the first Friday of every month, and he has a wonderful voice and a terrific backup sound system to complement his singing. He plays EVERYTHING from the '40's thru the '80's, (which makes Sparky happy because she LOVES the seventies!) So many places where we've parked for awhile seem to focus almost entirely on '50's an '60's music, which of course, is what everybody our age grew up with. But Sparky loves it when more modern music is played, so needless to say, we danced the night away last night, along with our friends Ritchie and Nick.

What was really cool, was there was a  much older lady, in her eighties, just beautiful with snow white hair in a stylish pretty black outfit. She came with her elderly husband and daughter. We were told they have been married for 65 years! After about an hour, the husband went home, and his wife stayed on to listen to the music. She was a beautiful, classy lady, all dressed up for the occasion, unlike a lot of us who are permanently casually dressed, because 1) it's Florida, and 2) we're retired and full timing! She had a cane to help her walk, and she was wiggling it in time to the music. You could tell she really liked music. One of the gentlemen at the dance came over to ask her to dance a slow one, and she was thrilled.

After about another hour, some of the old dancing favorites were being played, ones that you know, you just have to get up and dance to.  Lo, and behold, it was "Mony, Mony" that got her up and on the dance floor by herself! To the cheers of the crowd, she got up an shook her booty right along with the rest of us to "Mony, Mony"!  She really danced up a storm the best she could! It was wonderful to see! And everybody gave her a big round of applause as she walked off the dance floor. THAT'S what I hope to be able to do when I'm eighty.

My mom danced well into her eighties and she liked a good funky beat just as much as the younger crowd does. There were many times my mom would want to stay out dancing with my sister and her husband till after midnight! The lady we saw last night reminded me a great deal of my mom. She even had the same hairstyle. It was just really heartwarming to see someone much older still able to get out and move darn well on the dance floor! We really enjoyed ourselves last night at Florida Grande.

5 comments:

  1. Once in a while I watch RFDTV on Saturdays, which features polka bands and people dancing. There are all ages, very young kids and lots of oldies. I love to watch them having so much fun.

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  2. “Dance is the hidden language of the soul of the body.”

    I remember sneaking down to our office one Thanksgiving--to dance-it happened to be to the sensual music of Chris Botti. We listened and laughed as everyone wondered where we went.

    They finally found us--and I had to go up to finish cooking, but what a nice little getaway it was. Still smile thinking of it.

    Food may be the way to a man's heart, but dance is the way to a woman's.

    Never miss a chance to dance--especially before bed.

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  3. You may never be to old, but lack of rhythm is always a problem for some:)

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  4. Great picture of you two in red togteher. You'll need to wear that to the Valentine's Gig.

    Love to dance but I'm one of those 50's and 60's oldies types. Give me the mashed potatoes and Wait Til' the Midnight Hour. Yeah Man!!

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  5. Great Blog and great next door neighbors. Our kids would need a picture to believe. Thanks.

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