Get Your Groove On, Cultural Hall Singles-Style!

I just couldn't pass this up. Every Mormon living single or who formerly lived single, understands about the 'Singles Dance': an institution instituted to benefit the 'singles', to give us a romantic place to meet each other. Bless them for trying, but a church gym with some balloons taped to the wall and a folding table of chips and punch does not make for romance.

Singles Dance traditions differ in each stake. Back home, my stake hosted a dance the third Friday of each month. The Region hosted a dance on the first Friday of each month. I had to go to my stake's because I was YSA rep forever for my ward. The 5 active reps had to rotate dance chores, like cleaning up and dj-responsibility. Ah, the singles dance dj, usually some brave LDS music-geek or dj wannabe who doesn't mind doing it for free. Our stake was lucky because we had George who owned lots of cool equipment. The DJs at our dances got to use his laptop to program the songs. I haven't been to a church dance in years. But I remember in our YSA stake meetings, the issue of song-lyric-cleanliness came up once in awhile. They tried to make us have all songs pre-approved before the dance. That didn't work. But, today as I was surfing the bloggernacle I came across a post from Number1Nun. Sorry I don't know the HTML to give you a link straight to her post. It's the one starting with, "HOLLA" dated 4/08/04. She writes about her bishop, not only asking for a preview list of songs for the next singles dance, but actually suggesting that the DJ play "I am a Child of God".

Yes. You read that correctly. Check her blog and see for yourselves. Do they want us to stay single forever?? Isn't it bad enough that the People at a dance feel humiliated and nervous, that the music is terrible, that the sweet couple missionaries are chaperoning, that the lights are too bright, that you sometimes find yourself hiding from the creepy old dude or sweaty boy, or you find out the one interesting guy there is 19 and about to go on a mission, that you sometimes get to watch ex's macking on other people, or that sometimes no one of the opposite sex wants to dance with you and then it's even worse because you find them all repulsive?.....No! That's not enough.

Now, at Nun's dance they want her to play sweet, spiritual primary songs to get everyone in the mood. ? How do you dance to that? You couldn't even do the missionary shuffle [walk around in a circle slowly holding hands]. To what end does her bishop want this song played? Here are some of my guesses:

To remind everyone to leave some room for the holy ghost.

To remind them of their awkward childhood so they feel more confident and flirty.

It's a morale booster for those whose egos are getting abused, "It's ok no one wants to talk to you because you are a child of God."

So the couples making out in the parking lot will knock it off out of guilt.

To prevent the giggling girls from gossiping about each other, "Don't say that about her hair, she's a child of God too!"

To remind the RMs that it is their Godly duty to find a wife, so they better get to it!

What do you think her bishop is thinking? He has good intentions, what are they? Leave a comment. (Thanks Nicole!)

Come back for more TRUE stories of the strange, sad and pathetically hilarious exploits of me not having sex in the city.