When I got home last night S informed me we had no wine, and it was a near emergency since he had worked cleaning the garage all day. And since it was dance class night for me, and we were headed out for necessities anyway, S recommended we stop at the fish market next to the grocery store. Sure, I said, let's try it.

It was dreadful.

The man behind the counter with the enormous brow and tiny little eyes shook his head and blinked and whistled through his teeth as he tried to find the appropriate keys on the register screen. He ogled at me and frowned at S and made a huge deal about the twenty dollar bill I gave him to pay for our hot fried shrimp.

We sat near the door and found ourselves overpowered by the horrific pop music, cheesy synthesizers and Paula Abdul with her raspy voice that could etch glass screeching about wanting to get married. We didn't speak but ate as fast as we could and then ran to the car, where we finally vented about our mistake in restaurants, but at least it was inexpensive. And then S poked me in the leg and said, "That was your boyfriend in there." I growled at him and he said, "Yeah, you know you like him." When I swatted his knee he laughed and apologized for teasing me.

We bought two bottles of Syrah, which S informs me is one of the oldest type of grape. I like the dark color, close to garnet, and the sweetness that lingers on my tongue. When we got home we had some wine, mostly to assist in the digestion of the fried shrimp that had been strangely uniform in size and shape. Then I dressed all in black dance clothes, grabbed a coin belt and my zills, and headed to class through the light drizzle of rain.

Any doubts I may have had concerning the woman who took over my dance instructor's class were dismissed last night. She's wonderful, sassy, sexy, and very knowledgable. H & I were the only two students who showed up for class, which meant a semi-private instruction, and I enjoyed it. We worked on posture and stretching out our hips and waist, looked at the curves of our bodies as we undulated, focused on the curve of the hips and where the neck meets the shoulders, rolled our hips around in figure eights, and I felt great although I barely broke a sweat. It was play, not the workout to which I'm accustomed, but that's just fine.

We also looked at arms and hands, at grace, at positions, and she talked about energy and chakra and paintings and sculptures of anitiquity, Aphrodite, Cleopatra, Shiva. She's an older woman and I was ready to dislike her because she can be brassy, and she's still a bombshell and knows it, got the va-va-voom going on, but she's telling us her secrets, how to walk like you're in wet sand, let the hips settle a little, how to roll the shoulder back and then step, graceful and with intent. The grace comes from strength, from a long strong spine, from the hips solidly beneath the body and the center of balance.

I learned a lot, and was still buzzing with thoughts of dance and motion when I returned home to find S in a comedic discussion with B, who is staying with us indefinitely. Usually their conversations are political and all-consuming and they'll discuss the problems of the world, find the common threads, make suppositions, inform each other of books and theories and controvery and conspiracy and generally I stay out of it.

But last night the fires were burning and conversation rolled towards ridiculousness, Kermit the Frog, Madonna, and Britney Spears' initials. We came up with two reality tv shows, and since none of us watches television we all thought they sounded truly hilarious: "Your Elected Official On LSD," and, "The Osmonds vs. the Osbornes." And S quoted me again, from a ridiculous night with my girl R, on how laughter is better than a bag over your head.

If you're hyperventilating, I meant to say.