Maureen and I went to the Hazel Dell Valentine’s Dance this year.
The name Hazel Dell itself seems to present a sense of coziness and friendship. The two kilometre drive off Hwy 49 simply re-enforces that very feeling. We are met at the door by a local volunteer who sincerely expresses happiness that we took the time to come out to their event. It makes one feel that you are actually serving the community, not just coming to satisfy your dancing needs, h’mm Maureen’s dancing needs. It is this feeling that Maureen and I get when we go to Old Time Dances in the area such as Melville, Wadena, Dubuc, Yorkton and others we have surely missed.
I am indeed filled with awe when I see local pioneers slowly make their way to the dance floor and seemingly lose several decades of living when their feet pick up the beat from the band. The folks on the floor, smiles beaming, seem to slip back in time in mind and body and pick up the happy rhythm of the music produced by the band. I see couples performing dance moves not even understood by some of the younger members there. To Maureen and I this is living the live culture performed right before our eyes.
And the stories at lunch break. I never get tired of listening to them. A generation of people who had very little as they grew up and slowly through mostly hard physical work built the infrastructure most of us enjoy now. They have survived many hardships and much uncertainty through the years. Very few would have had it any other way and dance their dance proudly. However, I have a sense of sadness when I look around the room. What will happen ten years from now when these seniors are all that much older. Which band will play the music? Who will be the dancers?
We have dancers in their 70’s and 80’s driving home for sometimes over an hour after the dance ends towards midnight. There are few people in the 40 to 60 year old range out there dancing or even there period. Must be something good on T.V. In any case, as I talk to these elderly seniors in the dance halls, they for the most part have come to peace with few younger seniors coming out to the dances. Seemingly much more than I have. They are not lamenting. Right here, right now, they are dancing.
Perhaps I need to dwell a bit more on the awe and soften on the sadness.
