I danced a little in my undergraduate studies, mostly at parties and most often motivated for the purpose of picking up girls. I didn't need alcohol and I enjoyed the dancing but did not dance alone. Then, a few years later in graduate school, I met a real dancer who later became my wife. Quite by accident.
I had broken up with a girl and really wanted to be with her. One thing she loved to do but we never did, was dance together. So, I went to a club that was having dance lessons so I could win her back. I walked in, figuring I could find a partner to learn with and looked around. Only one woman was available; she was shorter than I, a couple years older and was watching with intensity. She was cute! I walked over and asked her if she would take the class with me. She looked around, looked at me and with a roll of her eyes like "Why me?", said yes. We started learning to waltz. I was trim and fit and in my best male mode. Also, I really like music and I had a good sense of rhythm. I learned the basics fast and soon we were doing things way beyond what the class was doing. We danced for five hours before she told me she was a ballroom dance instructor who had gone there to support her sister. I later learned she was also a world-class swing dancer. We agreed to meet again the next Tuesday at a local bar so that I could learn more. I gave up on the other girl.
We danced together as partners and members of a small group for three years. We also competed in swing dance and in ballroom, traveling all over to do so. I finally finished grad school and had to leave. But she could not leave as her daughters who were finishing high school. Now, I wanted to do the marriage thing. So I left. We saw each other a couple times the next year and then she literally disappeared. Over the next three years, I kept dancing at local places a couple times a week, went through one bad relationship and a really bad engagement and was alone when she called out of the blue, in town, wanting to dance. We went out, danced and I found out she was now moving back home because her father was ill. I asked her to call again when she was in town as she really was making an adjustment in her life. Six weeks later, she was back in town and we went dancing. Then, in a parking lot after a very rare midnight breakfast, she agreed to be my wife. We were married six months later, after the last of the girls graduated college and her father was back on his feet.
We have danced at least once a week for the past ten years and have entered a couple regional competitions. Everywhere we go, we dance. Last spring, we would dance in the lobby of a huge hotel in Nassau. We would stop traffic and get applauses. Then, I came out to her and all hell broke loose. She even left me twice. But we still sat everything aside and went out and danced.
In the really short version of a post to come later: two weeks ago, after some of the worse days of my life and after a lot of crying by both of us, she admitted/decided I was a woman. She also said "I love you, no matter what you are or how you look". And she meant it. We will go out together as to women and I will live as a woman. She is helping me dress as a woman and dance as a woman (which is very different). In boy mode, I loved to dance with a partner but would never dance alone. In boy mode, I was there to make her look great and to look great making her look great. As a woman, I still love to dance with a partner but also love to dance alone. Alone is more free and that is how I feel.
