Dancing while I dust!

They say that only a true blue Viennese can sit perfectly still through a waltz. Well, I am neither Austrian nor a twinkle toes, but I find movement to music totally irresistible. Almost of their own volition, fingers and toes will tap in rhythm and the head will nod and sway.

From earliest memory, we seem to have had music at home with either radio or wind-up gramophone playing the songs of the times. We picked up the melodies and the lyrics on the way and contributed our voice at parties and picnics. And, of course, we learned the dances that matched the tunes: we waltzed to Bing and Frank, jived to Tommy Steele, gyrated to Elvis, cha-cha-ed to Trini and swayed to the Beatles. Radio Ceylon and All India Radio made sure that popular requests were aired very regularly enabling us to ‘develop’ a taste for certain vocalists and their refrains. So, we sang and danced our way through school and college; there was always a piano to thump on and no dearth of voices or partners!

The working world was a different place – ‘whistle while you work’ was not a practice that was encouraged and the seven dwarfs have, somehow, never found their way into management manuals! Listening to music, therefore, had to be saved for the weekends. Come Saturday morning, I would load the trusty two-in-one with the first of many tapes, let the music rip and karaoke my way through the day. Yes, I danced while I dusted (I still do!), ‘twirling’ from chair to chair and using a convenient cupboard handle for a partner. Sometimes, the dogs came in handy, which is probably why they searched for safe hiding places as soon as they heard me humming! Hubby’s two left feet were firmly set in concrete and since he refused to repair his reputation, dancing with him was reserved for the romantic rather than the energetic numbers.

For me, all of life holds a rhythm and I simply cannot imagine a world without music.

Even now, while I blog, the multimedia player on my trusty computer is spinning a disc: Placido is singing ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’, the feet are tapping, the head is nodding and the fingers are dancing on the keys.