THE PEANUT GALLERY: All She Wants To Do Is Dance

Where does she get it from? Where does Peanut get her desire and ability to dance?

After all, she's seen me dance, like a monkey stuck in quicksand. When I do manage to move my feet, I'm miming some joke move. I'm sure you're familiar with the shopping cart, the sprinkler, and the lawnmower?

So where does she get it from? Certainly not her mother. My Director may be graceful in many areas of life: skiing, decorating, diplomacy, but she dances like a wounded gazelle.

Genetics be damned, Peanut is a dancer. She loves going to dance class every week, except for one Saturday morning where she threw a fit because the leotard she wanted to wear was in the laundry. (Oh, the humanity.)

At dance class, when I'm not dodging in and out of gossip with the other parents (moms), we're taking turns looking into the classroom through the tiny Alice in Wonderland windows, trying to catch a glimpse of our budding ballerinas perform their pirouettes and plies. (I had to google how to spell "plie'.") Finally, on observation day, we got to sit in the studio and watch. I couldn't take my eyes off Peanut's performance:

Given her love of dance, we were surprised when she refused to channel her inner Paula Abdul at my brother-in-law's wedding earlier this month. Instead, she kept her thumb in her mouth and her butt in her seat:

Apparently, she had hit a wall shortly after dinner and grumpy Peanut had replaced our little P-Lo. At that point, I had already consumed at least three of these: (Who counts at a wedding?)

Jack on the rocks with a twist

Therefore, I was ready to treat that dance floor like a tissue and put a little boogie in it. Peanut, however, was not. Until she had a piece of chocolate wedding cake. That's when she transformed into the dancing queen, sans tambourine, and didn't leave the dance floor for two hours:

Some of us need Jack. Some of us need cake. Whatever poison gives you the courage to get on the dance floor, the important thing is you enjoy yourself once you're out there. (And don't make a fool of yourself.) I can't say I didn't make a fool of myself. But Peanut sure didn't. Whether she is actually good at dancing remains to be seen. While my dad was known to shake his groove thing and rock the twist, genetics are not on her side. But I love watching her dance, because of the joy it brings her.

To see actual video of Peanut dancing (to her favorite song), click here.