{"id":2997,"date":"2017-04-06T18:35:57","date_gmt":"2017-04-06T18:35:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/?p=2997"},"modified":"2017-04-06T18:36:14","modified_gmt":"2017-04-06T18:36:14","slug":"crossing-the-unexpected-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/2017\/04\/06\/crossing-the-unexpected-line\/","title":{"rendered":"Crossing the Unexpected Line"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Growing up, Jordan Smith \u201917 said there wasn\u2019t much for high school students to do in his hometown in northwest Indiana.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_3000\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3000\" style=\"width: 225px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3000\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2017\/04\/Jordan-Smith-225x300.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"225\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2017\/04\/Jordan-Smith-225x300.png 225w, https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2017\/04\/Jordan-Smith-768x1024.png 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 225px) 100vw, 225px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-3000\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jordan Smith &#8217;17 wearing his DC&#8217;s Country Junction shirt.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>They were pretty close to Chicago, but that was expensive. There was\u00a0the mall, but that was normally overrun by middle school students. And because they weren\u2019t 21 years old yet, that ruled out a lot of the other options.<\/p>\n<p>So Smith and his friends learned how to line dance.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI had a group of friends who always wanted to go to this place called DC\u2019s Country Junction,\u201d Smith said, \u201cand I was always turned off by it because it was country. So they spent a good six months trying to trick me and get me to go.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Finally, his friends\u2019 efforts paid off. Smith thought they were carpooling to go celebrate his friend\u2019s birthday. Instead, he ended up at DC\u2019s Country Junction without a way out.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was $5 to get in,\u201d he explained, \u201cand I\u2019m the type of person that, if I\u2019m going to spend money, I\u2019m going to at least attempt to enjoy myself.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It took a while, though. The first time he got out on the dance floor, Smith laughs remembering how he didn\u2019t know how to do anything the other people were doing. There was a lot of confusion, and a lot of bumping into other people.<\/p>\n<p>For many, that type of experience would be a turn off. But for Smith, it was a challenge he wanted to take on.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI went back the next week and got a little bit better. And then the next week. At first, I just wanted to show people that I <em>could<\/em> do this, but then I eventually started to like it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So then for three years straight, the dance floor of DC\u2019s Country Junction was where Smith could be found almost every Saturday night.<\/p>\n<p>Though he doesn\u2019t get back home much anymore, Smith can still be found breaking out some of his line dances at local clubs and bars. Sometimes he dances alone; other times, people who know the dance jump right in there with him.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDC\u2019s Country Junction taught me two things: to never judge a book by its cover and that you\u2019ll never know what you like until you try it,\u201d Smith said. \u201cI saw the word country, and automatically assumed that it was not for me.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt doesn\u2019t come up much in conversation,\u201d Smith laughed, \u201cbut I still remember how to do most of the dances, and I will happily do them anytime, anywhere if you ask.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Growing up, Jordan Smith \u201917 said there wasn\u2019t much for high school students to do in his hometown in northwest Indiana. They were pretty close to Chicago, but that was expensive. There [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"w_featured_image_url":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2017\/04\/Jordan-Smith-768x1024.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2997"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3004,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997\/revisions\/3004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}