back
|
 |
Remember Dancing? They Do
By Mary Reinholz, The New York Times
February 8, 2004
Though Abe Thompson of Northport flew 50 bombing missions over Europe during World War II and spent 73 days as a prisoner in wartime Switzerland, military hardships and a career as a grocer did little to prepare him for coping as a lonely single guy after Bertha, his wife of 53 years, died in 1994.
But Mr. Thompson got lucky. While receiving some dental care at the V.A. hospital in Northport, a staff member told him about "a whole nest of places" around Long Island where older people gather to dance and sometimes find dates. She gave him a list of four, and on the night of the first ballroom dance he attended - at the Narragansett Inn, a catering hall in Lindenhurst that was destroyed by fire in 2001 - he met the second love of his life, Rita
DeLuise.
What first impressed him, he said, was her hair, swept up in what used to be called a Gibson Girl style, as she stood on the edge of the ballroom floor with three of her lady friends. "She was the only one who didn't look like a bimbo," said Mr. Thompson, who presumably also calls them as he sees them as vice chairman of the Huntington town planning board and as a trustee of the northwestern Suffolk chapter of AARP.
He asked Ms. DeLuise to dance and the two hit it off almost immediately. "I liked Abe right away," said Ms. DeLuise, a widow whose late husband, Nick, was the brother of the actor Dom DeLuise. "He had been recently widowed and I could identify. I like to dance, especially the Peabody, which is a very smooth dance. He started to call and we would go dancing three and four times a week."
That was more than a decade ago. Mr. Thompson, who is now 88, and Ms. DeLuise, now 76, have been companions, lovers and dancing partners ever since, stepping out at places like the Bavarian Inn in Lake Ronkonkoma, La Grange Inn in West Islip and the Northport Yacht Club. Occasionally they go to the Masonic Temple in Babylon, which has dances every Saturday night.
On Jan. 17, Mr. Thompson, Ms. DeLuise and four of their friends attended a ballroom dance called the Bennetts at the Suburban Temple in Wantagh.
The event was one of many such shindigs that Audrey Bennett, 68, of Westbury, has organized for more than 20 years as part of a family business she once ran with her late husband, Carl. Once a month she rents the temple's dance floor. She also publishes a monthly newsletter, the Social Club Calendar, which lists other dances on the Island and parts of Queens, and she books dance weekends in the Catskills for an upstate company called Star Dust Dance Productions.
Ms. Bennett noted that the monthly dance socials at the Suburban Temple, a Reform synagogue on Jerusalem Avenue, are a big draw for older people "because I give them a lot for $14," the admission fee. "They have a whole Saturday night with dancing, refreshments - bagels, muffins and coffee, a dance lesson and a show," she said.
Several years ago, Ms. Bennett hired six dance hosts to partner the single women who generally outnumber the single men at her events. At first, she had the hosts wear red carnations, "but they couldn't get to the tables because the aggressive women would just jump them," she recalled. "Some of these single women are really aggressive. I've been to dances where the music stops and they go running for the next partner."
Such activity was not in evidence at the Wantagh event, where about 250 people of a certain age packed the first-floor Suburban Temple ballroom. Many of the women arrived in satin and velvet dresses glittering with sequins and gold trim. Some flashed slit skirts, ample cleavage and fancy dancing shoes. Partnered by mature men and hosts who were confident on the floor, they shimmered and shook, whirled and swiveled their hips and dipped back in graceful arabesques.
Calling the tunes were two D.J.'s, Lori and Lenny Isaacs. They are Ms. Bennett's daughter and son-in-law, and they regularly perform at her dance socials. "We also do a lot of private parties and kids' parties" around the Island, Ms. Isaacs said. "We play for all different age groups and we do some dance weekends in the Catskills."
Mr. Isaacs, who has a day job with a software company, said that ballroom dances are notable because many of the older people have fewer inhibitions than younger dancers. "They know how much fun it is to dance, and they don't need much encouragement to go out on the floor," he said. "They come from a time when they could see big bands, and we play the music they may have danced to."
"But they also like to try the new stuff," Ms. Isaacs said. The couple, who live in Westbury, have two dancing children, Justin, 14, and Kelly, 13, both of whom attended the Jan. 17 dance.
During the half-hour group dance lesson, the instructor, Donna DeSimone, 45, of Mastic, asked that men and women interested in learning the merengue form two lines and face each other as partners. About 100 people lined up, while at least 100 retreated to the sidelines or their tables.
"This is all about hips swaying," Ms. DeSimone informed her students. "Do you see my hips O.K.?" The crowd applauded when the men successfully followed her instructions to "turn her out and draw her back in!"
Ms. DeSimone said later that her older students are generally "very attentive."
"They work hard and they ask questions," she said. "We have fun and I tease them. A lot of them are retirees and this is something they can do with their wives. They dress up, it's their night out and they thoroughly enjoy it. Some of them have been dancing for years. A lot of them are very good learners even if they're just starting out. They just have a passion for it.
"And it's a great way for singles to meet," added Ms. DeSimone. "It's social, it's fun and it's good exercise."
Brent Nagy of Westbury, a 40-year-old bachelor and mechanical engineer who works at the United Nations, looked positively pubescent amid the mostly elderly dancers in his blue satin shirt and matching tie. He danced with his mother, Dawn, who had a red heart design appliqued on the bodice of her black dress.
"I've been coming here about two years," Mr. Nagy said. "I just want to practice my lessons. You have to be a good dancer for the ladies these days," he said.
Bernice Monaco of Seaford, a buff 60-year-old divorcée, seemed to confirm Mr. Nagy's assessment, noting that her dates "must dance."
"Ballroom dancing is very romantic," she said, "and once you're on the floor, there's magic between you. People are mesmerized."
Ms. Monaco, who has two children and works as an administrative assistant in Mineola, said she has been ballroom dancing for 10 years and took lessons. She said she had been to disco clubs, "But disco is freestyle and you're not connected with your partner like you are with ballroom dancing."
She said she met a gentleman of 65 at one of the dance socials she attended last year. "I was involved in a romantic relationship with him for five months and now we're the best of friends," she said.
But other older women reported that finding a date at a dance, or any other venue, is tough. "It's very difficult because at my age the men are either too young or too old," said Marlene Zoine of Lynbrook, a vivacious 59-year-old airline stewardess and divorcée whose wedding reception was held in 1970 at the Suburban Temple. "Truthfully, I don't come here to meet anyone," she added. "I know the people and I just love ballroom dancing. When I'm dancing I feel I'm in another world. It would be nice to meet someone but this is a lovely crowd of people, the ballroom dance crowd. You can come to something like this as a single woman and some of the couples are so lovely their husbands will dance with you. And if someone doesn't ask me, I'll ask them."
Of course, as perennially optimistic singles like to point out, you never know what's going to happen. Ed Geller of Westbury, who had come to the Suburban Temple event and admitted only to being "over 65," said he met his second wife, Gloria Geller, nearly 16 years ago at a dance social at the North Shore Towers in Glen Oaks, Queens, and proposed on the third date. At the time, he was a widow who had been married 38 years. Contrary to the prevailing view that most men are looking for younger women, he said, "I just wanted the right person and then I met this beautiful lady."
"We both came to the social early," recalled Ms. Geller, who had been married for 25 years and divorced for 10 when she met Mr. Geller. "You meet someone when you do what you want to. That's what we found. I wasn't planning to get married. Then he came along and asked me to dance."
Both agreed that there is life after 60 and beyond. "My husband tells me that we're still on our honeymoon," said Ms. Geller. Her husband gazed at her adoringly as the dance music played on.
Copyright © 2002
Global Action on Aging
Terms of
Use | Privacy
Policy | Contact Us
|
