Hey y'all!! I'm Becky Sue and I have been teaching line dancing at the Silver Spur every Thursday night since the spring of 1995. Before that I was the one standing in the back row with my arms crossed saying "I don't dance." Well. Look at me now.

This page is for everybody who has ever stood at the edge of the floor and watched forty people turn the same way at the same time and thought "how in the world do they all KNOW?" They know because somebody taught them, and somebody counted it out slow, and then they did it about a hundred times. That's the whole secret. There is no other secret. Come Thursday and I'll count it out for you.

Every line dance in the world is built out of maybe a dozen pieces. Learn the pieces and you can learn any dance off a step sheet. Here are the ones we use in the first four weeks.

I wrote this one for the first class I ever taught and I still teach it first, because it's got a grapevine, walks, heels, toes, a turn and a kick-ball-change, which is nearly everything. Any medium-tempo country song with a solid four beat works.

Where beginners get stuck: count 26. Everybody wants to turn RIGHT because they stepped forward on the right foot. Nope. Step right, turn left. Think of it as your right foot pushing you around to the left. Second place: counts 21-24, folks touch the toe to the side instead of back. Back!

Short and quick, for week three when you've got the shuffle down. This one moves, so leave room in front of you. It fits anything fast with a shuffle beat.

Where beginners get stuck: the half turn on 12. Step LEFT forward, turn RIGHT. Same idea as the Shuffle, opposite feet. If you end up facing sideways, you did a quarter instead of a half; that's the number one thing, and it's why we drill it without music first.

A busy dance floor on a Saturday night is like a racetrack with a picnic in the middle. Here are the rules of the road at the Spur, and they're pretty much the same everywhere.

• Line dancers in the MIDDLE. Couples on the OUTSIDE. The outside lane going counter-clockwise is for two-steppers, waltzers and anybody moving around the floor. The inside of that lane is for the swing dancers, who go around slower. The center is ours. If you're line dancing on the outside lane, you are a rock in a river and somebody is going to hit you.
• Fast lane outside, slow lane inside. If you're two-stepping slow, stay toward the middle of the traveling lanes and let the fast folks pass on the outside.
• Don't stop on the floor. If you lose the dance, step off or step to the middle-middle and watch till you catch it. Standing still in the lane is how people get boots on their toes.
• Line up with the person in front of you, not next to you. Leave an arm's length all around. When the line turns, the spacing goes with it.
• Don't teach on the floor during a dance. That's what Thursday is for. Nobody wants a lesson at 10 p.m. on a Saturday, least of all the person you're trying to teach.
• No drinks, no cigarettes, no hats over your eyes on the floor. Set your drink down. Wet floor, sliding boots, you do the math.
• If a line dance is going and you know a different one to the same song, join theirs. Two dances at once is a wreck.
• Say thank you. If somebody asks you to two-step and you don't know how, you can say so, and they'll usually offer to show you. If you say no, say it nice. It's a dance hall, not the DMV.

Feet first. Boots are traditional and the leather sole slides just right for turns. But you do NOT need boots for class. What you need is a shoe with a smooth sole that doesn't grip the floor. Sneakers with rubber soles stick, and a pivot turn in a sticky shoe is how you hurt a knee. A plain leather-soled loafer or a low-heeled dress shoe is fine. Some folks put a strip of duct tape on the ball of a sneaker sole; it works in a pinch.

The rest. Jeans and a shirt you can move in. It gets hot in there. Skirts are fine for the ladies if they're not so long you step on them in the grapevine. Leave the big belt buckle at home for the first few weeks; you'll be bumping into people and those things leave a mark. Hats are welcome but take it off if it's blocking your view of my feet.

And the honest truth: nobody at the Spur cares what you have on. They care whether you turn the right way on count 26.

Every Thursday at the Silver Spur Dance Hall, out on the state highway past the grain elevator in Cottonwood. Beginners 7:00 to 8:00, Intermediate 8:00 to 9:00, then the floor's open with the DJ till closing so you can practice on real people. $3 a person a night, kids under 12 free with a grown-up. No partner needed, ever. Wear the shoes I told you about.

Miss a week? Don't quit. Come the next week and stand behind somebody good. That's how I learned.

Okay. Listen up. Here's what I say at 7:00 on the first Thursday, and I'll say it here too because some of you are reading this at home working up the nerve.

You are going to mess up. Everybody in the room messed up. The lady in the front row who looks like she was born doing a grapevine? Spring of '95 she turned the wrong way on count 26 for three straight weeks. (Hi, Mama.) Messing up is not a sign you can't do this. It is the ONLY way anyone has ever learned to do this.

Nobody is watching you. I promise. They're all watching their own feet. The ones who aren't are watching mine.

You don't have to be coordinated. You have to be able to count to eight and walk. The coordination comes on its own, about week three, and it surprises everybody, and it'll surprise you.

You don't need a partner, a boyfriend, a husband, a wife, a friend or a ride. You need three dollars and a pair of smooth-soled shoes. Come by yourself. Half the room did the first time.

And when it clicks, and forty people and you all turn the same way at the same time on the same beat, and the song's going and the boots are all hitting the floor together like one big boot, you're going to grin so hard your face hurts. That's why I do this. Y'all come Thursday. I'll count it out slow.

Becky Sue

Neighbors down the street: Fiddle Tunes by Ear (Old Joe plays for our hoedown night every spring) · Hometown Pickers Bluegrass Jam · Songwriter's Corner · Salsa Night! Beginner's Guide (different music, same rule: nobody is watching you) · Ballroom at Sixty