You make me feel like Dancing

October 2, 2009

From both–”You’re a what?”

From writers–”I never knew you were a dancer!”

From dancers–”How weird. I would’ve thought by looking at how you dance, that it’s something you’ve been doing since you were little.”

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So far in my life, the writers cannot grasp that I love to dance. And the dancers are astonished that I would spend time writing. But whenever one art form seems to grow thin and brittle in my creativity, I turn to the other to bring the juicy flavor of expression up from my heart.

I covered this in a previous blog, but I fell in love with writing when I was 13 years old. It was a passionate affair,that also had ups and downs, but largely, we were happy together, writing and I. Mostly poetry, some prose. We hit a bump 10 years ago, that turned into a major roadblock, that turned into a damn mountain, and I found I was too broken hearted and devastated to write for a good long time. Say, 5 years.

And during this time, I turned to Dancing. I had already dabbled with irish soft shoe, ballroom, a dab of salsa and swing, free style boogie and of course belly dancing from many years before. I knew I liked the freedom of body, the stretch on my limbs, the pull and challenge of my art, to express myself with NO words whatsoever. It was very liberating, and scary at the same time. Writing allows this little thing called editing, you see. Writing is also a solitary form, you don’t have to share a single semicolon or elipsis if you don’t want to. But Dancing… is unpredictable. You never know where it will take you.

Never know when a particular move, combined with a certain series of notes, or a passionate percussionist will draw spark and tinder out of you. Set you, literally, on fire.

Dancing frees me from convention, from control. It opens me, and empowers me. It heals me, and sometimes angers me too.

I came to a point where I realized I wanted to go further in my role as “follower”. I decided to try out the form that’s intimidated and awed me since I was a little girl-Argentine Tango.

I told myself, its not rocket science! How hard can it be?

HA. HAAAHAA.

I started Tango approx 3 years ago, and have had a hard time sticking with it, purely due to money and timing of getting to class (not a good time of night, not near my house, either.) But I love it like nothing I’ve ever loved. It fevers me, it challenges me.Tango is demanding. Period.

During this time of getting closer to Dance, Writing started to poke me in the ribs again. It’s been enough time, we need to reconcile, she said.

I missed you too, I said. Terribly.

Eventually, I started very slowly to write a blog on a social networking site with friends from Burning Man who didn’t know about my Writer Past. I grew more confident, started sharing more. Dancing took a back seat, and waited with crossed arms.

Now I have both Muses, and they both hold a place in my heart I can’t imagine living without. But they don’t exactly live well, *together.*

I try and balance, but the expression and needs of Tango, sap all the words right out of me. I love the exercise, the flirting, the physicalness of the Art. I love how social it is, so far superior to working out at a gym. For me, anyway. I love the clarity Dancing brings-if the body likes it, it moves that way. If not, it hurts. It’s so simple that way!

Who knows if I’ll fall in love with more dance forms. I certainly hope so.

Please take the time to look at the videos, they are so amazing. Even if you’ve seen them before!