US Army wives learn striptease for returning spouses

The women arrived on time; they were,after all,army wives. Demure in sweat pants,cotton T-shirts and dirt-smudged cross trainers....

The women arrived on time; they were,after all,army wives. Demure in sweat pants,cotton T-shirts and dirt-smudged cross trainers,they looked ready for a pilates workout. Until Amanda Knight slipped on a pair of blood-red high heels. And Jen McNeil wrapped a blue-and-white feather boa around her shoulders. Then Lily Burana,the instructor,cranked up the music.

Shoulders dipped,hips thrust,knees bounced,legs kicked,boa feathers fluttered. One for Uncle Sam,yall! Burana shouted. There is a long and honourable tradition of military wives and,these days,military husbands going the extra romantic mile for spouses returning from war. A quiet weekend without the kids. Candlelight dinners. Some slinky lingerie. But striptease?

Enter Burana,an exotic-dancer-turned-writer-turned-Army-wife who has endured her own deployment blues and is now trying to channel the cultural mash-up of her life into a morale-boosting quest. She calls it Operation Bombshell.

Every few weeks,Burana travels to some strip-mall-laced military town and offers 60-minute classes in basic burlesque. Though she knows a thing or two about removing her clothes to thrumming music,nothing much comes off in her classes except boas and gloves.

A little of this stuff goes a long way, she instructed. No one expects Operation Bombshell to save marriages,though if it encourages a bit of hanky-panky,that would be fine,Burana figures. You dont owe me a book report, she told the women. Mainly it is about breaking the doldrums of long,lonely deployments.

Military wives are the strongest women that I know, she said. Its moving every 12 to 18 months. Its multiple deployments. Its raising your children without a spouse at home. Its trying to work when youre moving as much as you do. All kinds of things that are absolutely mind-bending.

Most of the dozen wives in this class have husbands in the Third Brigade Combat Team,which is scheduled to return from a yearlong tour in Afghanistan this month. For Katie Waage,24,this is her husbands first deployment. She was hoping the class would give her a bit of that sexy feeling but was now fretting about whether she could remember the routine. Burana promised to send a cheat sheet.