The Dance

As long as I hear a few of my favorite songs and get twirled around the dance floor one or two times it's a great night of line dancing. I hadn't gone for quite awhile, a few months anyways. But the girls were going and I decided to join them.

A good Christian girl should probably not enjoy this type environment so much, but I have to admit that it's one of my favorite places. The people are real, the songs are honest and there is a concentrated effort of unified dancing. Men and women of all ages and backgrounds show up for the evening...some dressed to only draw attention, some faithful regulars, some laid back and truly just there for the dancing. Most of them (us) searching, for a good time, for a partner to dance with, a person to go home with, for fulfillment, for a connection that has not yet been found anywhere else.

There comes a point in the evening when the whole room is singing the same song, out loud and with all the passion of alcohol and the roots from whence they came. It's a beautiful thing, and I laugh right out loud. I like to think that Jesus would have loved this place, these people....probably way more than me. I like to think that He would have turned the place upside down with His love. I sit there and wonder how I can do the same, and I pray for open doors. Most of my time is spent with a smile and with short conversations during slow dances. All the same, when I meet a pair of empty eyes, I want to reach out and bring life.

This place also brings back a bittersweet memory of last spring. For a period of about two months, I and a few friends came here searching as well. I learned very quickly, that it was not the place where I would find my answers. And just about the time I realized this fact, my heart was put to the test. I was leaving, walking out of the place, and then I was asked to dance.

The dance lasted about a month. I thought it was the answer to my prayers. I made the comment to my sister, "It just made me want to live again." I was pulled out of my sadness and shown a whole new world. I had hope for better things to come. I wanted more from life than I had ever wanted before. But this man who asked me to dance, who called me three days later, who prayed over our dinner, who held my hand on a moonlit beach, who made me laugh right out loud, who could seemingly read my heart like a book, who allowed me to be myself appeared out of thin air and then disappeared again not too long after.

Sometimes, I sit on the side of that same dancefloor and remember the surprise I felt that evening. I sit there and think to myself, how impossible the odds were that we would be at the same place and the same time, how improbable that such a connection would be made. I have NEVER felt that way before.

Last night, I wanted that hope to return. I wanted so badly for him to walk through that door again. It would be different, in the face of disappoinment, but it would still be an answer to this mystery. I talked to God all the way home about it. Then, last night a friend from myspace posted the statement "When we loose something, the gain is greater than the loss." Notice it said "loose" not lose. The truth is I haven't wanted to let go of this thing, this hope that he would return again. Even 8 months afterward I am thinking about it. I don't know why he disappeared...I never got an explanation. I have wanted to believe that God would bring us back together again. I wish I could put it all into words, how deeply this chance encounter touched my heart, just to convince anyone and even myself, that he was not just another guy...doing what guys seem to be labeled for doing best. But I just have to let go...every day, not just yesterday and the day before...but today and every day after that..."loose" it and move on. I have to trust that God has so much more. Wow, I can't even imagine it...really I can't...so it must be good.

And whatever it was, the gain will be greater than anything I thought I lost. In the words of Garth Brooks, "I'm glad I didn't know, the way it all would end, the way it all would go. Our lives, are better left to chance. I could have missed the pain, but I'd have had to miss...the dance."