- [Narrator] Please like and subscribe to our channel
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- Back in middle school,
I wasn't really the type of kid to let myself have any fun.
I was afraid that if I let myself have fun,
I'd end up being judged and I, I don't like being judged.
(audience laughs)
- So eighth grade comes around,
prom is coming up, everybody's talking about it,
"Hey, you going to prom? I'm going to prom."
"Do you know what you wearing? You know who you going with?"
"Well, I know what I'm going with."
But me, I wasn't planning on it. I didn't really want to go.
I thought I'd just skip it.
I thought I'd just end up being a kid in the corner,
chicken in hand,
(audience laughs)
- just standing there.
(audience laughs)
- So, after being constantly bugged by friends and family,
I decided, you know what, what the heck, might as well go.
Let's just see what it's going to be about.
So graduation and prom was on the same day
'cause graduation was early on in the day.
We sang Celine Dion. I hated it.
(audience laughs)
- So...
I go home, I get dressed,
I throw on my suit. Had my little fedora on,
you know, stunting.
And...
I should mention that at first we had no idea
how it was going to get there.
We knew no buses that ran by.
So we figured we were going to take a cab,
but my friend Shannon comes.
She says, "Hey, my mom got a truck. You can swing by.
My mom will drop you off."
I'm like, "Oh, cool."
So my mom was okay with it.
They knew each other, they decided.
We decided to go along with the plan.
So, I'm going to my friend Shannon's house.
It's a block away from my house.
Not far.
She lives next to this daycare I used to go to.
Her family are Trinidadians.
They're, I've known them since birth.
They're like my second family.
We're all outside, chilling.
My mom's taking a bazillion pictures.
You know how they get around this kind of time.
(audience laughs)
And, yeah.
So typically, well, I should tell you first
that Shannon, Shannon comes outside
and typically she's a tomboy.
She's usually just here in a shirt, jeans, sneakers,
that's it.
But she comes out, she got her hair down.
She got her little white dress on.
She got the real huge hoop earrings, you know?
(audience laughs)
So now I'm standing here.
I'm like, huh?
(audience laughs uproariously)
Well now!
(audience laughs)
So we, we get in the truck.
It's about a fifteen, twenty minute drive,
not very long.
I get there.
All my friends standing outside.
"Hey Dante. Hey, you decided to show up."
I'm like, "Hey."
So I go inside; the space is a little bit smaller
than I thought it would be.
Granted It's not a lot of us,
but it was pretty fancy looking.
I thought it was a good place to be.
Music starts playing, everybody's on the dance floor.
I'm in the corner, standing there, chicken in hand.
(audience laughs)
I had a few people come up to me
and try to pull me on the dance floor,
but I wasn't moving.
I was not moving.
I wasn't moving for anything,
but chicken.
So,
The DJ decides to put on this song,
and now he's saying you know,
"everybody that's not dancing; got to grab them.
"Grab them, pull them on that dance floor.
"Anybody, you see anybody standing on the wall?
"You got to grab them, bring them on the floor."
So immediately twenty heads come at me.
(audience laughs)
- And, and try to drag me on to the dance floor
and at this point, I'm just done fighting it.
I'm like, you know what?
What the heck, I'm just going to go on that dance floor.
I'm going to have a good time.
I'm standing awkwardly in the middle of the dance floor
just looking around.
(audience laughs)
- So I try not to make myself look suspicious.
So I start doing a little,
(audience laughs)
- I start doing a little two step.
This, this is where I was at.
(audience laughs)
So,
gradually, over time, I start getting more into it.
The, the little, the little two step
turns into a little, turns into a little
shuffle.
(audience laughs uproariously)
- And, and I...
(audience cheers and claps)
- That shuffle turns into a crisscross
(audience laughs and cheers)
- and that crisscross turns into God knows what.
I don't even know what I was...
(audience claps)
- I don't even know what I was doing anymore.
(audience laughs)
- I just know that I'm, I'm on fire.
(audience laughs)
- And I'm busting moves I never thought was possible for me.
- And I wasn't aware of this
until I took the time to look around
and I'm stuck in that little circle they make.
Everybody's like, "Hey, go Dante, hey!"
So, And it turns out
that was one of the best nights of my life.
It is like my life up until that point,
I was locked in a dark room,
but then I decided to unlock the door
and I took a step out
and I learned how to dance.
(crowd cheers and claps)