Look, Mom, I Can Ceili

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

I'm going to go ahead and admit that my dancing experiences are limited to the Girl Scouts Father-Daughter Dance in fifth grade and the occasional loud music dance party in my garage... needless to say, I'm a little anxious about ceili. I mean, just last week, I was saying "see-lee" whenever I talked about it, until my friend Caitlin corrected me. How clueless can I be? (It's pronounced "kay-lee.") Well, I've decided to look up some things about ceili - I like to find out what I'm getting into.

I thought it might be difficult to get some background on ceili dancing... I mean, it's largely a retired practice, right? WRONG! I had no idea ceili was so big! Not only are there ceili events in Ireland and Scotland, but the United States has its own ceili culture, with festivals and dance-offs in metropolitan areas as well as rural towns like Columbia.

First of all, the Central Missouri Celtic Association offers ceili and set dancing almost once a month. Then there's more private dances, like the one in Jennifer Kimball's basement. She meets Tuesday night - I emailed her and asked if I could come along and tape some of her stuff. She was excited to hear that I'll be participating, too. They're always open to new dancers, she said. She has no idea that I'll most likely trip over myself or something... I'm going to go next week!

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