Photos: Ballroom Dancing at the Workhouse Arts Center in Lorton

It's hard to have a better time than dancing the night away with Bobbi Brennan in Lorton. Every third Saturday of the month she hosts an evening of ballroom dancing, appetizers and drinks at the Workhouse Arts Center. 

The evening begins at 7:30 p.m. where, for an hour, Brennan gives the attendees a quick dance lesson. 

"Most people who don't dance are afraid of taking the wrong step," said Brennan to Patch on Saturday night, March 17. ""I ask the visual learners to follow my movements as I dance on the floor and for the auditory learners I will ask them to close their eyes and listen as I describe what they have to do in great detail." 

Brennan, who lives in Woodbridge, has been a dance instructor most of her life, and got her start in Providence, RI, where she was hired without experience as an instructor at an Arthur Murray Dance School. 

"I didn't know my left foot from my right when I started," said Brennan. "They would teach me a step and I'd then have to turn around and teach it to a student. You can get pretty good at something if you have to teach it." 

Brennan also works as a vocational counselor for the Virginia Department of Aging and Rehabilitative Services. "I work with mentally and emotionally challenged people by day and then rhythmically-challenged people at night," she said. 

How long does it take to be a good dancer? 

"Within a year you can be very comfortable with all 13 ballroom dances," said Brennan. "And a lot of people will let out their tension on a dance floor. It takes you out into another world where you can be Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. You can be what you want to be on the dance floor."

Bobbi Brennan and dance instructor Cookie Bell teach ballroom dancing at the Workhouse on Mondays from 7:30-8:30 p.m. in building W-11.      

Brennan's class teaches the following dances: 

• Tango
• Quick-step
• Cha-cha 
• Foxtrot
• Viennese Waltz
• Mambo
• Bolero
• Swing
• Rumba

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