Am I a Yo-Yo for Hula Hooping?

My friend signed up for a hula-hoop class that she can’t go to and she doesn’t want to let this incredible opportunity slip by so she’s talked me into going to the class as her proxy. I’m to learn the proper technique and teach it to her.

She called me twice to beg me to do this. Once was early this morning because undoubtedly I was her first choice since I have a hard time saying no. I did say no, though. But I left the door open a crack by agreeing to allow her to call me back if she’d talked to all her other friends and they had the good sense to pass. She just called back and said no one else would go (fancy that) and would I please?

Let me ask you this. Why would it take 2 hours to learn how to hula-hoop? Granted, I haven’t been able to do it since I was a kid, and I don’t know if 2 hours is long enough for me to learn, but what if people in the class pick it up really quickly. What are they going to do all that time?

I agreed to go because she was so earnest in her groveling, and it seemed to mean so much to her, and Lord knows I could use the exercise. In fact, I’m thinking that my body shape may lend itself to hula hooping. If I can keep the thing riding on top of my spare tire I may re-master this valuable skill that used to engage me and my friends for a week or two in our 4th grade youth.

Hula hooping isn’t really a skill that, once you’ve mastered it, you engage in that often. It’s fun for a while, but then what do you do with it? Just stand there rocking your hips around? For what? I bet there are people who can do all kinds of tricks and entertain themselves and others with their expertise. I never wanted to learn anything that thoroughly. At the basketball game last night they had some guys doing tricks with bicycles that you can’t believe. They were riding backwards on the handlebars, riding up ramps and doing flips over the bikes in the air. Me, I just rode a bike with my feet on the pedals. These guys must practice for hours and hours.

Same thing with yo-yo’s. If I could get one to go up and down I figured I was a successful yo-yoer. But then someone comes along who can walk the baby and do a loop-de-loop and shoot an apple off someone’s head with one. I guess there is merit in learning such a skill. My yo-yos mostly ended up in knotted wads that I’d lost interest in long before I got them untangled.

Perhaps hula-hooping can be my claim to fame, my chance to be in the spotlight. Tomorrow I will show up at hula-hoop class and perhaps learn to jump through a hula-hoop like it was a lariat, or have someone toss it over my head and I’ll catch it on my waist and start gyrating it around, walking up and down the floor, shaking mariachis and balancing a plate on the tip of one foot. Now I’m getting excited!

Who knows what I might be able to learn in two whole hours. I wonder if that’s going to be enough time. I better make sure to arrive early!