Doing the Twist (and Squirm)

So my daughter is taking a dance class. A combination of tap and ballet. That’s not really pertinent, I just thought it would add a little more description and answer any questions you might have about the career path I’m putting her on. Shame on you.

Anyway, despite it being an innocent tap/ballet class for 3-5 year olds, involving no tawdry moves whatsoever, it’s still awkward. The waiting part, that is. The class is 45 minutes and, for me, finding something to do while she dances is awkward.

The lobby of the dance studio is small, particularly when it fills up with teen and pre-teen girls waiting for another class to start or waiting for rides after a class has ended. When these moments converge, which is every week, I become keenly aware that I’m the only member of the male population in sight. I don’t just stick out like a sore thumb, but more like a hand that is missing its thumb. Or an actual thumb, unattached to anything, lying on the ground. Possibly bloody. Yeah, come to think of it, the dismembered thumb is probably bloody because I really stick out.

Besides that, there aren’t many places to look. All the teenage girls are dressed as if they just finished an outdoor yoga class. As a father, all I can think is they need to have more clothes on (my daughter is covered head-to-toe with only her arms exposed, and I’m not totally cool with that either). I used to wonder if any of them were uncomfortable with me being there while they walked around in little more than beach attire, but based on the amount of giggling, it’s just me. The girls, as if you don’t know already, giggle in quantities that can’t be duplicated without large amounts of pot. “Look at the thumb in the corner,” they must be saying.

Fortunately there is a window in the lobby that looks into my daughter’s dance room, but it’s not very big and the other four parents gather around it to watch as well. During the few times I’ve gone to the class instead of my wife, I have squeezed alongside the other parents, all moms, for a few minutes at a time, but the little ones get distracted from seeing us. Not to mention I get claustrophobic. Not in the “I can’t catch my breath” sort of way, but more in the “Oh, there are other people here?” sort of way.

Since one of the walls of the dance room is a full window looking out into the parking lot, I can always stand outside in the parking lot and look in through the giant window wall. But the problem with that is, standing outside by myself staring into a room full of dancing four-year-old girls, I wouldn’t look so much like a thumb as I would a giant pervert. Particularly since there’s a window inside that I can look through without appearing pervy. The only person who would choose to stand outside and look in is someone who doesn’t have the option of going inside to watch. Someone who is on a list that the police might pass around your neighborhood, for instance.

I’m not sure what my options are at this point, but standing around the lobby full of giggling tweeners is out of the question. I might look through the window wall from the parking lot just for the joy of making other people uncomfortable, but that could lead to phone calls. Plus winter is coming.

(Sigh) Soccer season can’t get here fast enough.

Bending Bad. Or Just a Little to the Left

Given the immense popularity of the show for the last 4 – 5 years this certainly isn’t unexplored territory, but I can’t help but wonder if I have it in me to “break bad.” I came into the show late, so I haven’t seen the progression of the character of Walter White from beginning to end, but I’ve seen enough and heard enough to get a good feel for how far he’s come.

Knowing what I know about me, about my personality, about what I’m capable of, about my feelings toward my family and their well being, and imagining the desperation I would feel given the same circumstances, I can almost assuredly say no, I don’t have it in me.

For one thing, the reason I only recently started watching the show is because it’s on too late. I think that alone says everything I or you need to know when figuring if I’m capable of killing dozens of people (I’ve lost count of the actual number), including a well-respected drug kingpin who’s proven he’s capable of the same, all while running the most successful meth operation in the Southwestern United States.

Even for something I like and am not morally opposed to, like watching the show, I draw the line at staying up until 11 p.m. The only reason I’ve seen the last two seasons is because I now have a DVR. Come to think of it, the fact that I’ve only recently had a DVR is probably enough of an indicator that I couldn’t even stay ahead of the cops as long as Walter has.

I don’t appear to have the resources or the faculties to drain a train of its load of methylamine, even with four buddies helping me out. I’m also fairly confident that I couldn’t convince a room full of Nazis to simultaneously kill ten inmates scattered across three prisons, even if Nazis don’t need a lot of convincing to do that sort of thing. And I seriously doubt I could talk an old man into blowing himself up even if it means the explosion would kill his sworn enemy. I used to be in sales and based on my track record, I wasn’t very good at it.

I think the only thing we have in common is that I could pull off looking like Walter, at least when he has hair, but even still I couldn’t pull off the Heisenberg hat (and I’m not convinced he can either).

But I’m sure that’s a huge reason why I watch. I’m totally intrigued by everyone on the show because none of them are like me and their lives are nothing like mine. Searching for shows that have no similarities to my own daily routine is probably the same reason I don’t watch Ultimate Fighting competitions, “The Mentalist” or “Honey Boo Boo.”

Even with a full year before the next “Breaking Bad” season starts, I still don’t think I’ll fill the time watching those other options. Or cooking meth.

It’s going to be a long winter.