““Toward the end of that session at the Hudson, our instructor split us into two long lines and took out a bouquet of multicolored feathers. 'I would normally give the feathers to the ladies,' she explained as she passed them out, 'but we will have to make do.' Out of fifty or so front-of-the-house employees present, there were maybe six or seven women. 'The point of this dance is to think about giving and receiving,' she said, pressing play on her tiny boom box. A slow and stately march started playing through tinny speakers, a march to which we learned a simple dance: stepping up to our partner to give him the feather, stepping back to a bow, taking his hand, turning around, receiving the feather again, and stepping back to the line. 'Are you starting to feel each other's sense of space?' she called out. Someone sneezed. As the dance went on, we grew more comfortable with one another, fighting and roughhousing over the props. 'I've been defeathered!' 'Giveth the feather backeth or I will have to unsheathe my sword!””
