The tail end

There was a day, many years ago, when your parents put you down and never picked you back up.

The same is true of many wonderful things in life. Tim Urban put it poignantly in his 2015 piece The Tail End:

"It turns out that when I graduated from high school, I had already used up 93% of my in-person parent time. I'm now enjoying the last 5% of that time. We're in the tail end."

This doesn't just apply to parents. Many life experiences follow a similar pattern. As we age, we meet fewer new friends. We stop seeing live music. We travel in less adventurous ways. For most people, unfortunately, our worlds gradually contract.

The realization that struck me recently was that it had been years since I had danced.

In my twenties, two or three nights a week, I would get drunk and dance at nightclubs for hours on end. I loved it.

Then I quit drinking. Had kids. Started going to bed at 9 PM.

Suddenly, dancing was...just gone from my life. It felt like a small part of me had died—as silly as that might sound.

A few weeks ago, I discovered a local group that meets every Sunday to dance. It's sober. At 11 AM every Sunday in a big events space, a DJ does a 90-minute set and 70-100 people dance their heads off. Old and young, some with dreads and flowing robes, others wearing polo shirts and slacks. No rhyme or reason. Just people who love to dance, letting loose.

It's called Dance Temple. It started in Vancouver, and now there are groups all over the place.

It sure beats being hungover. If you miss dancing, I highly recommend seeing if something like this exists in your city.

Originally published in the Your parents put you down and never picked you back up. issue of Never Enough.