EVERYONE DANCED

A dance in the Village Community Hall was a regular form of entertainment. Dances could be organized as a special event; the aftermath of a card party or the last part of the Continuation School commencement exercise.

It took little preparation to stage a dance. A liberal scattering of cornmeal on the floor sufficed for wax, a fiddler and caller for the square dancing and a group of musicians, not less than three to play the waltz and two-step music.

A winter dance always drew a good crowd. Families from the village and the surrounding countryside attended. Young mothers and fathers came with their children. Babies usually slept through the whole affair and young children played hide-and-seek, hiding in the library, gallery, back stage or in the basement jail cells. Girls of eight to ten danced with each other and occasionally a young boy would be seen dancing with his mother who was endeavouring to coach her son in the fine points of a waltz.

The older generation gathered in groups to discuss the local happenings, exchange bits of gossip and if it was an election year to offer some sage remarks about the present political situation. During the winter months, when the roads were often impassable due to drifted snow, a dance frequently became an opportunity for most rural people to get together. A team of horses and a sleigh could usually make it across the fields to an open road that would take them to the village.

All adult conversation ended with the announcement calling for everyone to choose their partners for the next "square dance". The reserve energy after a hard day's work was called upon and the elder group of attendants demonstrated there was still life after forty.

The dance would end with lunch and the schoolyard conversation of the Monday after would be the girl or boy you sat beside during lunch. Many a grade seven boy blushed when his school chums teased him about Marie or Bessie; or Emily being his girlfriend.

Older teenagers paired off for the "last dance" of the evening and village boys would walk the heart throb of the moment home. Sometimes, if the front door was secluded by the shadow of the front yard maple, a quick hug and kiss would leave the youngman anticipating another kiss after the next dance. The lads from the farm areas had it all over their village peers; they could spend the time of the homeward journey, snuggled under a buffalo robe with the girl of his choice as he drove her home in his horse drawn cutter guided by the light of a full moon.

The village dance contributed to many local romances. Frequently, couples when they gathered for a wedding anniversary dinner, would relate how they had met at the Community Hall Dance and that she was the girl every boy wanted to dance with; and he was the one boy who really knew how to do the Charleston.
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