strathspey@strathspey.org:27831

Don MacQueen

Invitational etiquette (was Pre-Booking)

Oct. 10, 2001, 8:47 a.m. (Message 27831)

I would like to add a corollary to Richard's very sensible sounding approach.

A personal policy of mine, and one that I believe is generally 
advised in our area,
is this: if one declines an invitation to dance the next dance (for 
any reason) it is
then extremely rude to either accept a subsequent invitation to the 
same dance, or
issue an invitation to someone else to the same dance.

[If the reason for the original refusal is because of a
pre-booking, that would be the only exception I can think of, and the refusal
would of course be accompanied by an apology. One of the reasons
why I don't like pre-booking.]

-Don

At 5:12 PM -0400 10/9/01, xxxxxxx@xxxxx.xxx wrote:
>      A couple of years ago I was the one male who accompanied 3 or 4 local
>dance lady friends to a far out of town tea dance, so it was somewhat
>expected that I would at least dance with each of them in the afternoon,
>and during intermission we arranged for that.  Alas, that ended up booking
>the last 4 dances of the day.  Imagine my emrbarrassment when a lovely
>young lady with the hosting group asked me to dance toward the end of the
>program, and I had to decline for all the remaining dances of the day.  She
>was rightfully miffed.
>
>      So now I have a new policy which I share with anyone I book a dance
>with (other than the first and last for my favorite lady of course):  Yes
>let's book a dance, and yes let's look for each other during the prior
>dance, and yes let's try to get over to one another for the dance, BUT.. if
>anyone stops us in between and asks for a dance before we can hook up, then
>we accept, and thus avoid appearing rude or hurting someone's feelings.
>Everyone I've used this caveat with has accepted it and thought it made
>sense.  My significant other and I also use this approach for mid program
>dances we have hoped to do together; we feel this especially important as
>there are usually more women than men present, and she does not want to say
>no to and potentially alienate a male requester who probably has many more
>opportunities available to dance with the opposite sex than she.
>
>      And yes I admit to having been seen at times scurrying across the
>dance floor determinedly with my head down and eyes averted.
>
>Richard Brown
>Conklin, NY


-- 
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Don MacQueen
xxxx@xxxx.xxx
California, USA
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