YOLO, or You Only Live Once, has been trampling over the internet like the staff of a stereotypical police department on their way to a doughnut sale. As with most internet memes, YOLO has been misused about as many times as firearms in the hands of children. However, there are once in a life time moments where YOLO is entirely called for. Allow me to elaborate…
Yesterday night I had a plan to hang out with one of my best friends in the world Jackie. She was going to come over after work and we were going to figure out something to do. Lacking any form of creativity, my chances for proposing an awesome time were as slim as Ghandi. However, I received a text message shortly before Jackie arrived from one of my other besties; Christin. It was an invitation to come to a swing dance at the local high school. She would be performing and she wanted to catch up since we hadn’t seen each other in months. I agreed to come.
Well Jackie shows up and I throw out the idea of going to the swing dance (she knew Christin too). She thought it sounded like fun and then we hung out until about an hour before 6 (when we thought it was supposed to start) and then went over to Tim Horton’s for some dinner.
Now, for my Southern readers, many of you may have never heard of Tim Horton’s (or Timmy Ho Ho’s as it’s affectionately known). Allow me to illustrate the awesomeness level:
This level.
“Are you here for the dance lesson?” says the only other man in the room.
“Uh… when does the music actually start?” I ask.
“Seven.”
“Oh.”
I turn to Jackie and we start tossing back and forth the idea of leaving and coming back when the music was actually going to start. In the meantime, the man who asked us about the dance lessons kept saying, “Stay for the dance lesson! Learn to swing-dance! Come on!”
I look to Jackie and think to myself, I’m totally the type of person that would do this right now, but I don’t know if Jackie would be into it. Then I thought to myself, clearly I’ve been away from Hampden too long because I know Jackie and I know that if there was anyone that would want to do this right now it would be her.
So we spent an hour learning how to swing dance. We tripped and messed up and made fools of ourselves and laughed so hard we cried. The hour seemed to go by in seconds. We were taught four or five moves. We learned two. Just before the band got out to play Christin came over and hugged us both, I ended up seeing many of my other good friends, and then the music began.
Jackie and I were cautious to go out on the dance floor, we knew we couldn’t go out and dance until multiple other people were on the floor. Afterall, we only knew two moves and if we were the only ones on the floor then everyone would watch us and it wouldn’t be long before people would comment, “Wait, they just did that move didn’t they? There they do it again!”
Don’t lie! I’ve seen you do that move eight times!
So we waited, and in the meantime I ran into an older friend by the name of Andrew. Andrew is an efficacious writer whose talent for prose is rivalled only by the humour he puts into it. I’m an admirer to say the least. Andrew told me that he had been reading my blog from time to time and enjoyed it. If this didn’t make my night, then the fact that people were finally getting up to dance did.
Jackie and I got up among the dancers and used those two moves like a surgeon uses a knife. … albeit the surgeon is uncertified and blind, but we sure felt pretty good about it for what it was. Afterall, we had decades of practice in relativity to the lifespan of a housefly. Christin even commented that she was impressed by our moves, and both Jackie and I were grateful that she clearly wasn’t paying very close attention.
We laughed and danced until things died down. We left to head home, but on Jackie’s suggestion we swung by the local elementary school and played on the jungle gym. As the night grew dark and it started to rain softly, Jackie and I reflected on the night and concluded that what we had done that night: that was YOLO.
AsAlone As You Can Be 