Smyrna resident keeps M.O.T. Line Dancers on their feet
By Rebecca Henely
Staff Reporter
rebecca@middletowntranscript.com

            They’re a fixture at the M.O.T. Jean Birch Senior Center and have won numerous awards. However, Lee Candy, the 67-year-old leader of the M.O.T. Line Dancers, won’t let the group rest on their laurels. She is always looking for something new for the group.
            Candy goes to dance workshops a few times a year. She gets new dances from many sources like a Hockessin teacher, an online dancing magazine and other Internet sources. She once even tried to choreograph two dances of her own, but was unsatisfied with the results.
            “I’d rather take someone else’s dance,” she said.
            The M.O.T. Line Dancers is a dancing troupe currently made up of about 25 women ages 50 to 80, although senior men have been and are still able to participate, Candy said. Decked out in dress-shirt-and-black-tie or bib overalls, the members dance to country, gospel and other types of music.
            She said those who participate in the class don’t always do so for performing. In fact, she has a beginner class, which currently has about 15 people but sometimes has been as small as four or five, and an intermediate class. These groups do not perform, some members are in the group primarily for exercise, but members are trained to perform if they wish.
            “It might take you a year or so, but the goal would be to move up,” she said.
            The ultimate goal is the performing class, which dresses up and goes on the road. They’ve danced at the center, at the Peach Festival, at nursing homes and in contests.
            “You have to have a certain amount of confidence to get up and dance with others,” Candy said.
            Candy said she is not comfortable calling it an advanced class, as advanced steps are limited due to the physical restrictions. Still, it’s not necessarily easy.
            “It’s an hour-and-a-half class, and I work them,” she said.
            Candy is a former antique dealer who also owned a vending business with her husband. She’s been a member of the M.O.T. Line Dancers for 13 years and has been an instructor for 12. However, the Line Dancers group is older than that. Candy said they go back about 20 years and originally started in the old senior center.
            It can also be a social activity, Candy said, sometimes too much of one.
            “Sometimes they’re so busy socializing that I have to get their attention to get them to dance, but that’s a part of it,” she said.
            However, Candy said her only rule is the dancers all come to the last practice before a performance if they want to perform. This is an important rule when the dancers sometimes skip for a vacation or weather or being busy.
            “I have heard every excuse in the book,” she said.
            Candy began learning how to dance from a teacher in Camden, Wyo., after she was recuperating from breast cancer.
            “I figured it would be good exercise,” she said.
            She and her husband later moved to Smyrna. After she retired, a friend took her to the senior center and she joined the line dancers. Six months later, she saw an ad in the paper asking for a teacher.
            “[I said,] ‘I’ve never done this, but if you don’t have anyone else, I’ll try it,’ ” Candy said.
            At first, Candy taught the class on a rotating basis with another teacher, but that teacher ended up quitting.
            Candy said teaching so quickly wasn’t much of a problem, although she had to learn how to do specific leadership tasks like calling the steps and learning the steps in advance.
            “I knew the basics of how to dance,” she said. “It was just a matter of learning how to teach it to others.”
            Since then, she said the exercise has contributed to her overall better health, and has assisted in her working through her two knee surgeries and her scheduled knee replacement in October.
            “[The doctors] say I should have a good recuperation time because of the exercise,” Candy said.
            The beginner M.O.T. Line Dancers class takes place on Mondays from 12:30 to 1:15 p.m. Intermediate class takes place Mondays from 1:15 to 2 p.m. The performing class meets Mondays and Fridays, starting warm-up at 9:30 and beginning proper at 10 a.m.
            Call the senior center at 378-4758 for more information.