My youngest son was asked to his first “couples” dance a few months ago. He’s almost sixteen but still has zero interest in romance at this point in his life. That’s fine with me, but when a young lady ask you to a dance, I don’t care what she looks like. If she had the courage to ask, he will have the courage to say, “yes.” Thankfully, he is still a good and fairly obedient son, so I didn’t have to twist his arm too hard to get him to answer the young lady.

For weeks he complained about not being ready to do this whole dance thing.

“I’ll teach everything you need to know,” I said. “It’s whatever she wants. If she wants to dance, you dance. If she wants to rest, you rest. And whatever she wants to do for dinner, so do you. See…isn’t that easy?”

“But I don’t know how to dance.”

“That’s why you have me.” I held my arms open and shook my spirit fingers for all they were worth. “You’ll be the coolest boy there because you’ll know how to waltz, and I can even show you how to give your date a twirl, and maybe even a dip.”

The day of the dance finally came, and I was worried. All morning long his attitude hadn’t been the best. What if Mr. Cranky decided to stay for this girl’s evening? I remembered how much going to dances had meant to me back then, so I threatened his life. “This is her night, so don’t you ruin it.”

The next morning I got a text message, first from the girl’s mom, then about an hour later from his actual date. My son had hit it out of the park.

“Thank you for letting your son go with my daughter last night. She said he was the life the party. It was the best dance date she’d ever been on.”

The girl even wrote that he was a “gentleman.”

It set my mind at ease. Maybe he does have a little bit of my goofball genes in him somewhere, though he would deny, deny, deny. Being unafraid, and having zero shame, always made it easy for me to dance however I wanted in front of people. And now that other girls have seen my son’s ability to be the “life of the party.” He might just get asked a few more times before he graduates in two years. Heehee…I’m so excited though he looks less than thrilled at the prospect.