I wish... I could street dance (part 5)

You don't need lessons to be able to dance. All you need is a body and a soul.

"Come on people, show me some energy! It can't all come from me," said JP, the street dance instructor. "I'm giving you my life here!"

We wannabe streetdancers were a bit subdued in my third and final lesson in October. But I couldn't help thinking it was the rapid, non-stop routine JP had given us that was partly to blame.

I wasn't the only person who was struggling. But I seemed to be the only person who was so lost that occasionally I stopped altogether and waited for the right moment to leap back into the routine. Like a surfer choosing a wave to ride.

I refused to give up. As planned, I practised the routine without constantly watching JP, and squeezed in extra practice during brief interludes when he was fiddling with the MP3 player or we all stopped to drink water. I didn't care if I dried up like an old prune; I was determined to learn the routine.

Despite my best efforts, my final performance was poor. I accepted that although my soul was willing and my body was able, my mind would not allow me to remember the routine in the time available. I needed more time. 

But there wasn't any. The lesson was over and next week we would learn a different routine. Why couldn't we learn and practice one routine over several weeks? I wondered. Then I could practice at home and nail the flipping thing.

I drove home in a huff. It felt like an anti-climax to the month. I had secretly hoped that the final lesson would be my best yet. That suddenly it would all click into place and I'd seamlessly perform the routine from beginning to end with power and precision and afterwards we'd be high-fiving and freestyling out the door, all the way to the pub.

My expectations were unrealistic. To become any good at street dance I would have to practice week in week out for years. That's if my body held out. And my ability to learn routines is unlikely to improve with age. So where does that leave me?

I will go to a few more street dance lessons. If I enjoy them, I'll carry on going. If I don't, I'll stop going. Because dancing should be fun. It's a way of expressing yourself. Personally, it makes me feel alive and sometimes takes me to a higher place. It's hard to describe.

You don't need lessons to be able to dance. All you need is a body and a soul.

So I'm going to end this wish of the month on a positive note. After lesson 2, the lesson that I most enjoyed, I filmed myself practising the routine in my studio. I'm clumsy, it's filmed badly, and I didn't dress for the task in hand. But I tell you what - I had a bloody good time doing it.

I wish... I could street dance! (The music video)

Join me again soon for a brand new wish of the month. What do you wish you could do?

I wish... I could street dance (part 4)

It's OK to miss a beat, as long as you keep going.

I needed practice. So I practised. I cleared some space in my studio after work, found the recording of street dance lesson two, and reenacted it. I did it over and over again, observing my performance in the reflections in the windows and praying that nobody was looking in. I got better. I think. The real test would come in the next street dance lesson.

Expecting me to tell you all about lesson three? Forget it. I didn't go.

There must have been a good reason, right? The lesson must have been cancelled or my car broke down or the Government introduced an emergency law banning street dance? 

Nope. Sorry. None of those things. 

The truth is, I didn't feel like going. I didn't want to. I didn't feel up to it. 

Doesn't sound like me, does it.

Thursday was my day off work. That's not unusual. I work most weekends so I often take a day off mid-week. I did what I normally do on a day off: I slept late, made myself a huge breakfast, and sat around in my pyjamas watching Hornblower. 

OK, I don't normally watch Hornblower. But it's the latest DVD boxset I've got my hands on, and like all DVD boxsets, it's completely addictive and I can't wait to watch the next episode. Play all!

It was all going so well until I ducked to avoid the postman. I didn't want him thinking I was a lazy slob. So I decided to do something productive with my day. I got showered, got dressed, and set about tidying up. Not just a superficial tidy either. A proper clear-out.

That's when I found the Christmas card. The Christmas card that my ex-girlfriend had given me 9 months ago, just before she left me.

It was like being punched in the guts. My breathing went funny. My eyes welled up. Suddenly I was back in our flat in London, laughing and chasing each other and calling each other Muffin and planning all the things we were going to do, like get married and move to Derbyshire and have wellies at the back door. Then we were arguing and crying and she was walking out of the door with a suitcase. Like in a soap opera. Only this was really happening. And there I was sitting in the dark again, hurt and alone and utterly devastated.

I tried to tidy my way out of a deep, dark pit of sadness. I threw out photos of her, a T-shirt she'd bought me in Canada, Christmas presents that I'd bought her and were still wrapped up in shiny paper. But it just made things worse. 

I went for a walk in the woods to distract me. It helped. For a while. Then the memories came back. We were going to get married this month; Saturday the 11th. We'd booked a hotel. She'd bought a dress. By the time I should have been leaving for my street dance lesson, all I wanted to do was curl up and go to sleep and make everything go away. I shut my bedroom door and switched off my phone. I didn't want to see anyone or talk to anyone. 

I'm gutted that I missed the street dance lesson. Heaven knows I need it! But I'm not going to feel guilty about missing it. I was in no position to dance. Unless foetal position is a street dance pose. I doubt it. 

I'll go to the next lesson. It's OK to miss a beat, as long as you keep going.

What is your wish of the month? Have you kept going?

I wish... I could street dance (part 3)

Concentrate on what you need to do, not what other people are doing.

I held my kit bag tightly against my chest. I was sat on the floor, back against the wall mirrors, watching fifteen children perform a street dance a mere spin kick away from my face.

It was incredible. They were incredible. I marvelled at their slick, fast spins and kicks and - I kid you not - back flips! I almost leapt up with excitement. The routine ended with all of the dancers diving to the floor in a caterpillar motion. 

We whooped and clapped. We being the adult street dancers who had arrived early and were invited in to watch.

"Wow, how good are they!" I said to Richard, the guy I'd met last week, as we exited and walked to the other dance studio.

"Yeah," he said, "Now we've got to follow that."

Fortunately the talented little blighters left the building before our class started. Our instructor, JP, taught us another eye-wateringly quick routine, this time to The Enforcer by 50 Cent. "Fiddy cent," said JP, correcting us. "Fiddy."

I had never heard The Enforcer before, but it didn't half have a good intro; big sound, lots of bass. I was already nodding to it.

The routine was a corker. It felt good, and looked it too, from what I could see of the other dancers. What's more, my timing felt sharper than the week before. But a familiar problem arose whenever JP shouted, "From the top!" I would start well, then halfway through I'd forget the next move and be left scrambling to catch up.

I got annoyed with myself. I knew that I could do the individual moves. I knew I could piece them together in short sequences. Why couldn't I remember the whole thing?

I realised that I had spent the entire lesson watching and copying JP. When he wasn't dancing, I was lost. What I should have done is learned the moves from JP, then practiced them by myself without watching anybody else. That way I would have learnt the routine by heart.

"Let's film this and put it on the Face of the book," said JP, running to the door five minutes before the end of the lesson.

What? Film it? Put it on Facebook? Are you mental? We've only just learnt it. And some of us can't even say that!

JP returned with a colleague who whipped out a smartphone and asked the class if anyone objected. A few of us in the back row glanced nervously at each other, but nobody refused. And so, holding our hands in front of us, and facing the floor, we waited for our cue.

This is what happened... on the Face of the book.

Did you spot me? Yep, I'm the prat at the back in the orange T-shirt. Boy am I glad I was obscured for most of that.

If that experience has taught me anything, it's that I need to practice. I need to concentrate on what I am doing, not what other people are doing.

Maybe I need to stop hiding at the back and step forwards.

What is your wish of the month? Have you been taking small steps forward?

I wish... I could street dance.

I expect you're shaking your head, laughing or feeling sorry for me at this point. I mean, come on, who am I kidding? Street dance?! I'm about as street as Emmerdale.

Hear me out.

I love dancing. There, I've said it. When I went to nightclubs and house parties in my teens and twenties I was itching to dance. I lost count of the number of times I stood cursing at a bar waiting to get served whilst the DJ spun one of my favourite tunes. Or how irritated I felt when the lights came up on the dance floor.

Gradually, without noticing, dancing slipped off my radar. Nights out bopping in a club or pogoing at a house party became nights foot-tapping in a bar, chatting in a pub, or putting the world to rights over wine in a friend's dining room. A natural progression, but a dancing regression.

I missed dancing. I dabbled in lessons in my late twenties and early thirties; salsa, which confused me with its three-beat rhythm, and swing, which was fun but didn't inspire me or my girlfriend (at the time) to return the following week. 

Nowadays the only dancing I do is at weddings, sending up The Inbetweeners Movie whilst trying not to step on small children. Often, by the time I'm sufficiently inebriated to venture onto the vast floodlit dance floor, I'm jostled into a circle around the newlyweds and kicked in the legs.

I wish I danced more. I wish I danced to modern music. I wish I danced like dancers in the music videos I watch on TV every morning (depressing news can wait until lunchtime). So that's what I'm going to do. This month I will learn to street dance. 

Some of my friends will probably give me a ribbing. Dancing is not a traditionally masculine activity in our society, is it? But films and TV shows have tried to correct that: Billy Elliot made ballet acceptable for boys, Strictly Come Dancing has seen cricket and rugby players foxtrot in sequins, and street dance group Diversity won Britain's Got Talent.

So tonight I searched online for a street dance class. I found one in Brighton. I'm going to contact the instructor and ask if I can join.

By the end of October I will learn to street dance. Beginner standard, obviously. Thirty-something white guy standard, definitely.

If I can face the humiliation, I might even show you some moves.

What is your wish of the month for October? I'd love to cheer you on.