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For more than a decade, Friday Night Salsa Fix gave us a place to end the week together.
• Some people came to learn salsa.
• Some came because their friends dragged them out.
• Some came every Friday.
• Others disappeared for six months and then walked back through the door as though they had never left.
• A few drove for 4hrs/ 6hrs / 8+hrs to share their love of dance with us. Like, wow! And Thank You!
There were first dances, performances, birthday celebrations, themed parties, visiting dancers, new friendships, old friendships and plenty of nights when nobody seemed particularly interested in going home.
And somewhere along the way, Friday Night Salsa Fix became part of the rhythm of our community.
There were events happening in different cities, but many of them came and went. If you wanted a regular place to dance, Toronto was often the most reliable option.
Guelph was nearly 100 kilometres away, but Friday Night Salsa Fix kept going.
Week after week, people came from Guelph and from communities around us: Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge, Hamilton, London, Mississauga and beyond. Sometimes people travelled much farther (Sudbury, Sault Ste. Marie).
Not to mention being a university city, many international students graced our dance floor.
We never saw that as Guelph standing apart from everyone else. In fact, one of the best things about social dance has always been how people move between communities.
You might take classes in one city, attend a social in another, meet dancers somewhere else, and then bring those friendships back home with you.
Over time, more instructors, organizers and communities began creating their own places to dance throughout the region.
And that is a good thing.
More places to dance means more people discovering dance. More communities growing. More friendships being made. More reasons for people to keep dancing.
When one dance community grows, it can help the others grow too.
Friday Night Salsa Fix simply happened to be one of the places that stayed consistent through many of those years, and we are very grateful to everyone who made the trip to Guelph and shared those Friday nights with us.
Today, the dance landscape is very different from when FNSF started.
There are now many more opportunities to dance throughout the communities around us.
So for us, the question became:
What should Friday Night Salsa Fix become now?
Not how do we compete with all the other socials.
Not how do we create another weekly party.
But how can we bring people together in a way that adds something meaningful to an already growing dance community?
And that question is leading us somewhere a little different.
Rather than continuing to add another regular social to an already active calendar, we want to create something a little different.
Our plan is to bring people together approximately five times a year.
The goal is not simply to create another evening of lessons and social dancing.
We want to create more room for conversation.
Social dancing naturally moves quickly. You dance for a few minutes, thank your partner, and move on to the next song.
Sometimes we see the same people on dance floors for months or even years without ever really having the chance to get to know them.
We would like these gatherings to slow things down a little.
To create time to sit together.
To share some food.
To introduce friends.
To reconnect with people we have not seen for a while.
And to meet some of the people from the many different dance communities around us.
The dancing will still be an important part of the evening.
It just will not be the only part.
We will begin around 6:00 PM with food and time to socialize.
From 6:00 to 7:30 PM, people can arrive, eat, talk, reconnect and meet some new faces before the formal dancing begins.
At 7:30 PM, we will move into two 45-minute dance sessions.
Afterwards, the evening will continue with social dancing, performances and time together on and off the dance floor.
The idea is simple: to create an evening where people do not only dance beside one another, but have a chance to know one another a little better too.
Friday Night Salsa Fix was part of our community for a long time, and many people passed through its doors over the years.
We are grateful for that history and for everyone who contributed to it; the dancers, instructors, DJs, performers, volunteers, organizers and the many neighbouring communities that shared dancers, ideas and energy with us.
What comes next is not about recreating the past. It is about taking what we learned from those years and using it to create something that fits the community we have today.
Fewer gatherings.
More time together | “Yep, in the world we live in, we definitely need more moments together” Nico
More conversation. | “Nodding – Yep, Yep, Yep. Lol” Nico
And, of course, plenty of dancing.
Want to make a difference in your community?
Through your kindness today, new and returning members of the FDComm dance community will have many more opportunities to kick off their shoes and dance their stress away. Dancing is a great way to stay in good health and create friendships that will last a lifetime.
Join us today and donate toward our local events and volunteer support. Thank you very much, from the bottom of our hearts.