Baby Dancing

Baby dancing is no where near as much fun as it sounds. Babies (for those of you who arent acquianted with any) cant dance, and no number of 40 minute classes is going to change that. So dont get your hopes up.

The class is run by an etherial long-legged spindly creature whose life's dancing ambtions obviously lie outside baby-dance-training for under 18 month olds.. We began by sitting in a circle, as is the way with all good organized fun, barefoot. I was relieved to be informed by our coach that this was to be an informal class.  (thank god I hadnt signed up for the formal baby dance lessons - whatever they might be.)  There was a lot of twirling around the room with my ton-weight child.  And lots of smiling at other mothers,   pretending to be at ease with 'free-style' dancing. The thought had struck me that I could very well free-style for free, at home, ... but that wouldnt help keep craziness at bay - which is of course the whole point of mother-baby groups.  Be it 'baby-dancing', 'baby-sensory', 'rhyme-time', each is really a thinly veiled lonely hearts meeting.

Then we returned to the circle, and were each given a feather. Ours was yellow, which was nice, but it it was  the tiniest most scrawniest feather I have ever seen. We did some tickeling with the feather, and I made a funny high pitched squealing noise - half in the hopes of keeping Es entertained, but also just because it seemed appropriate.  That is the really strange thing about baby-groups. They have a whole new social code all of their own - one which you wont know about until you go along and try it out for yourself.  (I not sure exactly what the code is yet, but I am certain that tickeling your baby with a feather without making some sort of squeal, or 'oooh' as well to show your enthusiasm for the task in hand, would be a violation of it.) Surely no where else on earth are such high pitched cooing noises part of social etiquette.

That was baby dancing.

Thought for the day: must stop high pitched squealing. Es does not find it entertaining. In fact so used to my high pitched squealing is she, that she now finds my everyday'adult' voice amusing. Im serious, if I try to talk to another adult human being (which is an infrequently nowadays - believe me), she looks at me and grin a big gummy grin, as if to say - who are you kidding we all know you are a squealing ideot.  Joe tells me idiot is spelt with an 'I' not an 'E' . Thank god for my editor.

Just realized it might be worth inluding a note to explain my choice of web address. It is cute - yes - but I havent chosen it for this reason alone. My preferred choice was the-baby-treadmill, but that was taken. No big surprise there. As far as things go, a merrygo round seemed like the second best metaphor for my life at present.  No I dont run round in circles all day on a hobby horse. Rather my days are characterized by repetition. There is no getting away from it, there are 7 nappies to be changed each day, three meals to be administered, 100 or so squeals to be made,  and so on - you get the picture.
And anyway merrgo-round-baby does sound CUTE.