Skip to main content

The Waltz


At a Finnish wedding, the tradition is for the newlyweds to dance to a wedding waltz during their reception. It doesn’t matter what kind of wedding it is, the waltz is an essential part of the program.
I hate the waltz. Compared to the Latin dances that I have been learning, the waltz is too stately and prudish to be of much fun. So I have jokingly told my boyfriend that at our wedding we will not be dancing the waltz.
In part this is to gauge his response to my presumption that we are getting married (a bit sneaky, I know). In part it is also to make sure he knows that I am most definitely not Finnish (though I tell him that I am 50% Finnish, 50% Indian and 40% American).
When I last told him there would be no waltz at our wedding, my boyfriend didn’t flinch at this challenge, to his immense credit. He just laughed. At which point I realized I didn’t even know how to waltz, which only made him laugh even more.
Somehow, after this exchange, he decided to put on some waltz music and grab a hold of me. We started bouncing across his tiny living room. The dance itself was still uninteresting to me but I found myself still laughing at the thought of someone seeing us and wondering why we were dancing in our kitchen. I was also unduly impressed that my otherwise rhythmically challenged boyfriend was dancing so well.
We both were trying to figure out the dance as we went along so I stepped on his toes more than once while we sashayed around. Despite our lack of knowledge (in my case) and practice (in his), we tried increasingly difficult combinations.
That is, until he slipped in his woolen socks, and I, trying to avoid the puzzle sitting on the side table that we have been working on for the past 9 months, was dragged down with him. We both were so surprised that we lay on the floor laughing at the sight of the other’s giggling.
In that moment, I decided that I liked the waltz after all even though it is decidedly less exciting than bachata, merengue or salsa. There may be space between your bodies and no alluring movement of your hips. The music may be orchestral and (to my unrefined ears) boring. But as I looked into his sparkling eyes in the middle of his kitchen, I saw happiness and contentment. And there was nowhere else either of us would rather be.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Small Acts of Love

A game of hockey going on on the river My boyfriend plays on a hockey team from September to May. It isn’t an official team—they don’t play games throughout the season and aren’t in any leagues—but they meet diligently every week for practice (he actually plays with two teams but it still isn’t clear to me what the difference is between them except that one team is better than the other). This requires some dedication because practices for both teams are either very late in the evening or very early in the morning. At the end of their season, before they take a break for the summer, the players come together and have a full-length game. I wanted to go last year and this year but wasn’t able to make it either time. Instead I asked him to send me a picture of himself in all of his gear. Last year he sent me a selfie of himself before the game, but without his gear on so I hoped this year he would manage to get a picture with both. He did not. I was willing to drop it, figur...
4 comments
Read more

Working Identities

The halls of a TC building where I must be a doctoral student It’s been a while since my last post. To be honest, I haven’t done much besides school work, to the point that the I no longer know what to tell people when they ask me what my hobbies are. Which also means I feel a constant looming pressure of knowing I live in a big city with a reputation for never sleeping yet I spend my weekends holed up in my room or in the library (and the occasional coffee shop). This is not to say that I spend all of my time doing doctoral work. I have found two outlets in the form of jobs that have enriched this semester in ways that I didn’t expect. One is at a preschool, the other is working at the Graduate Writing Center consulting students working on academic writing projects. After not working for two years, I had forgotten what it feels like to be part of something that allows for change that you can actually see. Teaching is always rewarding as you watch children grow and marvel...
Post a Comment
Read more

Finnish Differences

Time is a funny thing. It seems to move in leaps and bounds at times and at times it moves slower than molasses. Right now it's doing both. I can't believe it's only been a week and yet I can't believe it's already been a week. Sunset in Helsinki This week I've been in Helsinki for our Fulbright orientation. We learned a lot of information and it would be impossible for me to fit all of it into a reasonable amount of space so I will leave that summary for another day. But a week has given me some time to notice some differences in how things work in Finland and how they work in the US. I thought I would highlight five here that encompass a fair variety of my experiences so far. I have to give credit to my friend Marie who helped me with this list. Many of these are her ideas. 1. Nature is Everywhere This one is first because I think it is the most important one for Finns. Finnish people love nature and it shows in the way cities are built (at least th...
5 comments
Read more