By Erin Grigson
KyForward reporter
For the last four years, I have wanted to participate in DanceBlue. For whatever reason, I never did.
But in the fall of 2014, my fraternity, Kappa Kappa Psi, put a team together and I jumped at my last opportunity to dance.
And after 24 hours of no sitting, no sleeping and dancing my heart out, I can say that I am exhausted, but beyond happy that I stuck it out. Seeing what the marathon means to the children and their families during the Celebration of Life hour (about 22 hours into the marathon), I had my second wind and knew I could make it.
DanceBlue is primarily known for two things: the fundraising and the linedance, which is 10 minutes long and is done at the top of every hour. It is taught for the first two hours, but after that, to keep everyone busy and to make the time pass, each hour has a theme.
For instance, there was a UK tailgating hour featuring UK football players Patrick Towles and Zach West, a Derby hour, a rave hour, a live music hour featuring local band 64 West, a birthday hour celebrating a decade of dancing, a luau hour, the celebration of life hour, and the talent show when patients from the DanceBlue Clinic tell jokes, sing, dance and even have nerf gun fights with Marcus Lee.
Throughout the night, morale teams, the groups dancers are placed in for the marathon, competed in activities based on the hour’s theme. There was UK trivia, many forms of races, community service time, and more to give teams the chance to earn points.
My team did not win, but we passed the time by having fun and getting to know each other – and dancing, of course.
DanceBlue 2015 culminated with the reveal of the total funds raised since the 2014 marathon: $1,615,057.18. Knowing that I was part of that and that it was all For the Kids just made it an awe-inspiring experience.
I would recommend DanceBlue to anyone who wants to gain a new perspective on life and have a blast while doing it. It was life-changing to say the least and I wouldn’t change any of it.
Below is a gallery of images from my time during the marathon.
[smartslider2 slider=”7″]