This past Friday was the Holiday Party at my over-55 active adult apartment complex. I had no idea what to expect, and boy, was I surprised! Shocked, is more like it.
We have 156 apartments, so somewhere upward of 225 people. I'd say about 50 to 75 people came to this affair, most dressed festively. I think the average age of the residents is somewhere around 68 or 70, if I recall what the architect said a few months ago. It tends to be the younger, more spry folks that get out and about more, go to the fitness center, attend the events, go on tours, etc. I go to a lot of the activities, mostly because I want to get to know people in my new town and there are some really wonderful people here that are friendly, fun-loving, and incredibly generous with their time and caring. For example, a brand new resident, one of the younger ones, got carted away to the hospital earlier in the week (turned out to be pneumonia), and people jumped in to take care of her little dog Charlie, walk him, pet him, feed him, etc. But I digress....
The event drew the usual suspects plus a lot of people I hadn't ever seen. Everybody was in a good mood, and why not, because it was a Friday evening and the food and drink (BYOB) were on the house. People were socializing in little groups and eating -- the desserts were the best -- and things were relatively sedate, until...
...the D.J. showed up. Even then, he started off with music from the 1940s, which I wished he'd get past -- made it seem like an old folks' home. Fortunately, he did. He worked his way up to the 1980s and at that point, people started dancing. You'd think the first one on the dance floor would be the youngest, most active. But nooooooo! I looked up and the D.J. was dancing with, what! Could it be??? The lady in his arms was one of the ones who has a hard time walking. But there she was, light on her feet, smiling radiantly and dancing like she was 30 years younger. Go Raquel!
A few minutes later, a wonderful formerly quite athletic man who'd had a stroke and went everywhere on a motorized carrier was out there dancing with his wife. No kidding! Go Nat!
Then, a little lady who walks stooped over shuffled over to the D.J. and when I looked over a couple of minutes later, she had one arm up around his neck and the other on his shoulder and was dancing just like everyone else. Way to go, Mary!
Go figure. Is this like people who stutter when they talk but sing without hesitation? Whatever it is, it was heartwarming to see these people, these un-stars, dancing. They're stars to me -- I'll never look at them the same way again.