Nate Wunderli’ 22
Sports Editor
One of the first things I looked for when I came to Charlottesville was a dance club. My first-time social dancing was when I was 21, when a friend brought me to a country swing club. I had no clue what I was doing. I did one or two moves my friend taught me, then had to rely on my conversation skills to make up for my lack of moves. Still, I had a fun time, and met a bunch of new people despite my clumsiness on the dance floor.
Fast forward a year, and I was hooked. Social dancing, while still a great outlet to meet people, became something I liked to do regardless of how many cute girls showed up that night. It started to become natural: the spacing, moving with the rhythm of the music, using momentum to my advantage to lead my partner. Instead of just doing moves I had committed to memory, I became able to improvise and come up with new moves on the fly, sometimes accidentally. It was creative, athletic, rhythmic, and a natural way to connect with friends and total strangers.
Such was the inspiration for starting a dance night here in Charlottesville. As a 1L, I frequented a bar at IX Park near downtown and went Latin dancing regularly. It rarely attracted the student population, however, and paled in comparison to my undergrad where several hundred students would show up to dance every Thursday and Saturday. While my goal was to find a place willing to host on a weekend night, the forever reliable Crozet Pizza was kind enough to let me host a country swing dance night on a Wednesday.
I was a little nervous that I would get there to teach the lessons beforehand and have nobody to teach, but fortunately by the time I arrived (10 minutes late due to detour traffic) there was already a sizable number of people ready and willing to dance. Lauren Johnson ’22 and I taught a few moves, and then let people do their thing. I took music requests, sometimes quite peculiar ones,[1] and continued to teach moves throughout the night to different groups. Big thanks to everyone that showed up, and remember, you’re never too old to learn how to dance!
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nw7cz@virginia.edu
[1] Did not expect to play the EDM hit Purple Hat at a Country Swing party.