Fieldtrip to 2008 Emerald Ball DanceSport Championships

I really don't understand this enthusiasm for ballroom competition. Ballroom dance is a social activity for everyone to engage in for fun, exercise, to make friends, listen to music, and learn a little grace and a few manners. Dance teachers have turned ballroom into a stylized snooty competitive sport because that's where the big bucks are, but they're destroying ballroom dance as a social activity. I suppose competition has its place, but when is the last time you got excited about a painting competition, a poetry competition, a piano competition? They even have yoga competitions these days, if you can believe it. After investing tens of thousands of dollars in private lessons, clothes, make-up, and entry fees, what do these competitors get other than a 3rd-place sticker to put in their program? It's not like they can go to a social dance and enjoy themselves because they can't really dance with anyone but their partner or their teacher. After getting so little out of competition, the spent students often just drop out, embittered at having wasted so much money, and teachers are constantly recruiting new feeders.

Sadly, the Rec Center realizes where the gravy-train is and has ended support for social ballroom dance in Santa Barbara and thrown its lot in with competitive ballroom dance. So, I guess you can pay your $54 and go to the Emerald Ball and *watch* a bunch of people pretend to have fun. As for me, I'll save my money and go the Poinsettia Ballroom in Ventura on Monday evenings, get dinner, and dance to wonderful live music with my friends, all for $8. It's a lot cheaper, it's a lot more healthy, and it's a lot more fun.

Everyone has their own jag and their own nickel. Just think about how you want to spend yours.

(Information on social dance at the Poinsettia Ballroom in Ventura:
7:30 to 10 p.m. Mondays, Poinsettia Pavilion, 3451 Foothill Road, Ventura, $8, 805-646-4237)