A teenage dance form has recently become the subject of bemused discussion in local school boards. It may be described as: “A dance in which the boy’s pelvis is thrust against the girl’s buttocks.” For example, earlier this year the Bangor school board (which chose to use the euphemism “dirty dancing”) forbade any such goings on within the schools of that fair city. As Lucius Flatley observed at the coffee shop this week, “Things have sure changed since the days of the lumberjacks when the Queen City was known far and wide as a provider of permissive pastimes.”

At any rate, this dance – otherwise known as “grinding” – has joined with “hooking up” (another adolescent activity to be discussed at a future Flatley coffee seminar) as items of concern to school boards, as well as to other social police. In some parishes, these activities seem to have replaced same-sex marriage as topics of interest.

Whatever.

Flatley quoted Alfred Kinsey, a groundbreaking researcher, who said that the acme of male sexual ability is around age 16, a lofty peak from which a steady and inevitable decline occurs.(In an aside, Lucius noted that many 35-year-old rock stars and professional basketball players seem reluctant to accept that premise and, if reports are correct, Warren Beatty apparently has totally disproved it.) On the other hand, the female, according to the same researcher, has a different schedule – sexual inclination cresting some years later. (Lucius mentioned that this statistic also is rejected by folks in Utah and Appalachia, many of whom seem to feel that age 12 is optimum for a bride.)

Consequently, during the teen years, although the girl may achieve some social status, the boy appears to be the chief beneficiary of grinding.

One coffee drinker observed that grinding cannot be all bad for boys. He suggested that the excitement of this exercise elevates young males to a state that protects them from the hemp plant. Since marijuana inspires lassitude, dreamy dope smoking and energetic grinding would seem to be mutually exclusive. Therefore, grinding might be considered a form of D.A.R.E – a method of discouraging drug use.

Further, as a vigorous exercise, grinding provides benefits to the circulatory system and invigoration of the heart/lung complex, a marked improvement over tobacco, alcohol or TV couch time..

Beyond that, there is the modern world in which, along with attention disorder and Ritalin, the physical proximity of teenagers is welcomed. Some boys football teams even have girls as kickers. Many psychiatrists believe that gender mixing is necessary to ease the vicissitudes of passage through youth’s formative years. Same-sex schools are discouraged; healthy socialization in heterosexual society is desirable. What, then, could be more fitting than Grinding 101 as a course in teen development?

On the other hand, religious broadcasters and fundamentalist pastors, among whom sex seems to be largely an abstraction, if not actually a mystery, charge that teenage concupiscence is the work of the devil. If they are correct and the Rapture really is imminent, young grinders are perilously close a slippery slope at the bottom of which burns eternal flame.

And finally, the same deep thinkers who look forward the Rapture argue that sexual episodes are limited and that profligacy in teen years expends a non-replaceable number of performances intended for later use. According to this school of thought, nature provides only so many bites at the sexual apple.

Nevertheless, at that critical peak of 16 years, many teenagers (and some adults) would cheerfully slide down that slope. Ask Tiger Woods.

Rodney Quinn, who lives in Gorham, is a former Maine secretary of state. He can be reached at rquinn@maine.rr.com.