A Strange and Alien World

A few days ago Northwest Cable News had a special on a new form of exercise. Using Latin rhythms, Zumba involves aerobic exercise that's actually dance for the entire hour. You burn about 800 calories, and have fun at the same time.

So I looked up online to find the closest location. Since women are very into Zumba as a safe place to exercise, I asked first to make sure that it would be appropriate for me to attend, and not uncomfortable for the women participating. I was the only guy in the room.

It was intense. Lots of exercise and sweat. The music was fun. Mostly I had no clue what I was doing. There are just all these ways that women naturally learn how to dance, ways to move their bodies, that I really have no clue on how to do. I can't even really describe what those ways are- but even in today's egalitarian world, dance remains the place where gender is most defined. And I just never learned how to dance the woman's part. Part of it is definitely the hips. I don't know how to move my hips. Or how to belly dance, which was also part of the exercise regime. I just kind of faked it. Of course, the most difficult part of all is when our instructor told us to work on "the girls", pointing down towards our chests. We did those standing bench presses into the air that you often see in women's dance moves, while the teacher told us to make sure to do it right. "Lift them up, then down." I don't begin to know how to do that. Or even how to fake it.