Category Archives: Door to the Past

Dance 5: (Don’t) Stop

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When I was in my early 20s, my friends and I used to have awesome parties. We would get together at an apartment or a rented cottage, and we would drink and eat and hang out. OK, we still do those things, but the thing we don’t do any more is dance. We used to dance for hours. We had a special “parties” playlist, and every song had its own schtick. It was fabulous.

And then it changed. Dancing became something we did only at weddings. I don’t know why that happened…did we get bored of the same songs over and over? Were we less fit? More self-conscious? Just not interested? All of the above?

I miss those parties. I was “the dancing girl,” first to start and longest to move, never afraid to get up and dance alone. When did that stop?

This past New Years I was determined to revisit my fabulous younger dancing self. I was going to get up and dance, dammit, regardless of everyone else.

Did I?

Sort of. A little. Self-consciously. In the corner.

I couldn’t access that fabulous dancing diva. She couldn’t get out from under the layers of “not _____ enough.” Not fit enough, not strong enough, not confident enough. And also “too ____.” Too old, too fat, too unfit. Too likely to hurt myself. Too easily mockable. And what would my friends think?

…writing this out, it makes me sad. I’m not any of those things, not really. I’m fit and strong enough to dance, at least for a bit (and that will help me dance longer next time). I’m confident enough to post this video online, which has to be scarier than dancing in front of people I know and love, right? And there’s no such thing as “too fat to dance.”

The hurting-myself fear is a whole separate issue with its own complex layers, but the bottom line is that I will be OK, especially if I build my fitness up gradually. People who want to mock me can eff off. And it’s not like my friends have never seen me dance before.

So there.

This video is dedicated to the fabulous dancer-at-parties I used to be. The one I peeked at last New Years. The one I am dedicated to excavating fully by next New Years.

Want to dance with me?

 

What Are Your Awesome Stories? Here’s one of mine…

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It’s late fall here in Nova Scotia, and the weather (apart from some freakishly warm and much-appreciated days this week) is getting chilly. The other night I was getting dressed for a coffee date with a friend of mine, and I pulled out a scarf.

This scarf.

And it made me smile. Because the scarf has a great story behind it.

Over the summer between my first and second year, Skidmore College’s campus sprouted an art museum. The Tang museum opened its doors in October with an exhibit called S.O.S. Scenes of Sounds, and it featured all kinds of exhibits that made noise.

I don’t really remember being all that excited about the museum or the exhibition. At the time I’m pretty sure we all thought the museum was kind of funny looking. But then one day before the opening, this man came to watch our improvisation (dance) class. Our teacher told us that his name was Nick Cave and that he was looking for some dancers to wear his sound-making costumes during the museum opening.

So we danced. We danced our hearts out. And he watched. And at the end of class he picked 3 students to wear his costumes. I was one of them.

On the day of the opening, when the museum was packed, we got into costume and went outside. We started out on this big exterior staircase leading down to the main exhibit room. We walked down slowly, wearing our full-body soundsuits. Very slowly people began to notice our approach. And then we entered this narrow area enclosed between two walls (and doors) of glass, and we just went wild, improvising all kinds of movement in the giant, rustling costumes as the museum-goers watched. It was incredible.

I wish I had photos or video of us dancing in costume. Youtube wasn’t even invented back then (…I don’t think), and believe me, I’ve looked anyway.  The closest idea I can give you to what this was like was this:


Like I said, not a video of me. But you get the idea. WILD.

Several weeks later, I got a package in the mail. It contained a note from Nick Cave thanking me for dancing for him and presenting this scarf (from his fashion line) as a token of gratitude. I’ve treasured it ever since.

When I went looking for video of these soundsuits, I found out that he went on to make many, many more of them. He’s had exhibits around the world. Hundreds of people have seen them and performed in them. And I danced in one of them 11 years ago, right near the beginning. That’s pretty effing cool.

I think we all have stories like this one…not necessarily about dancing, but about a really awesome experience and a memory we treasure. Sometimes I feel like we don’t like to talk about them because it feels too much like tooting our own horn.

But you know what? Forget that…I say let’s share our awesome stories proudly. Let’s tell the world. Because the world needs to know that cool things like this happen to “normal people” (whatever that means). And stories are important. Your story is important.

What’s your awesome story? And don’t tell me you don’t have one.

Dancing With the Past: It’s never too late to finish what you started

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This is a piece of music from the soundtrack of the movie Pi. The year after I graduated from high school, I began to choreograph a solo to it. It was the most technically challenging and choreographically intricate piece I’d ever done. I worked on it for hours. And then I showed it to the wrong person.

And their comment was “Huh…it’s kind of sloppy, isn’t it?”

…I never worked on it again.

13 years later, I’m still sad about this. I’ve been through all the stages on this one: anger at the commenter, insecurity about my abilities, feigned indifference, anger at myself for giving up, and sadness at the entire situation.

Here’s what I know now: Of COURSE the piece was sloppy. I’d only just started…I only had the first third of it done. But it could have been great. I know it could have been great. I remember the very beginning, and it was amazing.

But I forgot all of this. I was so overwhelmed with pain and self-doubt that I gave up on it. I didn’t stand in my own power. And I have regretted it for more than a decade.

I am not alone in this experience.

Do you have a project you loved but stopped working on? Do you have a project you’re nursing tenderly and worried about sucking at?

Just do it. Trust your vision. Ride the wild donkey. Finish your project, no matter how many people tell you it sucks (or, alternatively, don’t show anyone until you’re done, that could work too). Trust me, “doing it anyway” sucks WAY less than regretting something for 13 years.

It’s NEVER too late.

I thought it was too late for me to finish this piece because I can’t physically do the dance steps any more. But there are always possibilities. I have a friend who can do the steps for me. It is never too late to finish what you started.

I’m going to do it.
You can do it too.

Please, just do it. Create that thing that calls out to you. Listen to it, bring it out into the world. The world needs your creations. Do it. Don’t let it hang over you forever.