Maniacs

Beams of lime green light move in synchronized swiveling sweeps from the stage. Vinyl records bellow from electric speakers. I have a yellow bubbly beer with an orange slice. I am not drunk. I'd like that to be noted. My cup stands surrounded by other cups, strangers of ice with red skinny straws stuck into most of them. On the floor, my purse and sweatshirt huddle together in a hidden heap. They wouldn't take purses at coat check. This is fine since they would have charged me $3. And because I haven't had a paycheck in over a month $3 feels more like $10. I call it the deflation of an unemployed person's pockets. We six dance like maniacs to the disc jockey's selection of 70s soul. It's awkward when we first get onto the painted black dance floor, but soon it's clear we all embrace some kind of individual love for dance. We twirl, squat, jolt our hips, point our fingers, shake our butts, clap, snap, run in place, mime holding a baby whenever the lyrics call a lover "baby", and mimic the opening to The Cosby Show as best we can. Some of us look insane. You know that saying that's usually carved and painted onto little wooden boards and hung on dorm room walls, the "dance like no body's watching" quote? Well, we literally dance like no one is watching. We feel the beat and jerk our bodies accordingly. Sometimes we look like modern dance aficionados, improvising choreography like salaried artists, but a lot of the time, we just look like we're poking fun at this old silly human tradition of moving to music. There must be a name for what we're doing, something like Freestyle Dance, but I prefer to just call it Fun.