The 2007 Yuletide Ball

Last year at this time, Agnes and I competed in the 2006 Yuletide Ball DanceSport Championships, held at the beautiful J.W. Marriott Hotel in downtown Washington, DC. This year I didn't think I was ready to dance our new routines, but one of Agnes's other students, Phil, wanted to dance, and so we found ourselves spending the afternoon at the competition. Phil and Agnes were scheduled to dance 5 heats: International Open Gold Waltz, Tango, Slow Foxtrot, Quickstep, and Viennese Waltz, and a Five-Dance Championship event (Waltz, Tango, Slow Fox, Quickstep, and Viennese Waltz, all danced back-to-back with minimum time between dances). It may not seem like it, but the Five-Dance Championships are grueling events in which you have to dance flat out, giving it 100% every second, because you never know when the judge will be watching you to look for reasons not to score you highly.

But I'm getting ahead of the story.

We met Phil at a local dance studio at 11:30 so he and Agnes could warm up before going down to the competition (almost all competitions make a warm-up floor available for competitors, but it's usually fairly small and often quite crowded). After the warm-up, we drove downtown and arrived at the hotel shortly after 1:00.

Agnes dressed in her ball gown, and we began by visiting the vendors. All competitions have a number of vendors available selling ball gowns, shoes, jewelry, music CDs, instructional videos, etc. Agnes needed some accessories to go with her new dress, so we visited Ann, one of the jewelry vendors we've come to know over the years. This year, Ann had brought her little daughter along ... with all we've spent over the years, I think we're financing her eventual college education.


Agnes bought a new hair accent, some earrings, and two bracelets to accent her new dress. She looked pretty spectacular (even considering that my opinion may be a little biased).


Phil and Agnes had quite a while to wait for their heats, and that can be nerve-wracking. But they managed to keep smiling.


Eventually, their heats arrived. The few seconds between the time the people in your heat are called to the floor and the time the music starts are some of the longest you can imagine ...


But things always go all right. Here, Phil leads Agnes in a beautiful throwaway oversway.


Another nerve-wracking time is the minute or two you spend waiting in the on-deck area for your heat to be called. Here's a sample of what that area looks like before a typical heat:


Once the heats have been danced, the next nerve-wracking time is spent standing on the floor while waiting for the results to be announced:


From the perspective of a hobby photographer, one of the great things about a dance competition is the large number of handsome, well-dressed men and beautiful, elegantly-dressed ladies who actually want to have their pictures taken. These two lovely ladies graciously posed for a picture:


Our part of the competition was over by about 6:15 PM. The awards were presented (solid places in the face of very stiff competition), and we were headed home. All told, it was a fun day spent with people who know how to have a good time and treat each other with courtesy and good sportsmanship.

Agnes and I are aiming for our next competition together in March. I'll let you know how it comes out.

In the meantime, if you are planning to celebrate tonight, please do it safely. Have a great new year's celebration, but be sure you're able to come back and blog next year.

Have a good day, and a fun and safe New Year's Eve. More thoughts tomorrow ... I mean, next year!

Bilbo