Fortunately, my lovely friend Eleanor is very experienced at
ceilidhs, and she nudged me and turned me and pulled me in all the proper
directions so that I did not hurt myself or kick someone else in the face.
In case anyone doesn’t know (I didn’t), a ceilidh is a big
social dance that is the funnest thing ever. The nearest thing I can approximate
it to is square dancing – it’s not the same kind of dancing, but there is a
band and someone who calls the dances.
The difference is that ceilidhs are awesome. No offense to
hardcore square dancers, but you know how the cool people of America wouldn’t
be caught dead at a square dance? Everyone wants to go to a ceilidh. The one we
went to last night was sold out, and it was packed. With cool people.
The dancing is I think Scottish country dancing, and it’s
simple enough at first when each dance starts but then it gets VERY FAST so I
spent a great portion of the night frantically spinning around and jumping up
and down and trying not to hurt anyone, whilst also trying to understand
instructions shouted out over the band in a serious Scottish accent distorted
by a microphone. I was screaming and laughing the whole time though, so I count
it as a grand success. I can’t really describe it, so here is a video I swiped
from the youtubes. It is not the ceilidh I went to, but it is in the same room, and I’m reasonably
certain we did that same dance at some point.
I should also note the after effects of a ceilidh if you are
as out of shape as me. I have NEVER done anything so physically demanding in my
life. It lasted three hours, and this morning my whole body hurts. Also I have
a dehydration headache, because I sweated out most of my body’s water content. *Seasonally appropriate movie reference alert*
You know that scene in Hocus Pocus when the witches wind up on stage at the
Halloween dance and they put a spell on everyone so they can’t stop dancing and
Winifred screams, “Dance! Dance until you die!!!”? That’s kind of what it’s
like.
