spaces in between

Honestly, looking back I don't remember being as unhappy as I appear in this photo. I do know that I was pretty out of touch with quite a lot of things back in the day that this was taken: music biz circa '98. I was about to spend some time touring with Bush (the band, not either of the presidents) for a book I was working on. And what I remember most were the moments that happened in the space between: when the stage lights went down and the band would begin. I would hold my breath in anticipation, almost wishing I could freeze that sensation of letting go of any knowledge about what would happen next: Then, bam, the lights would strobe up and the music would take hold and the crowd would start to scream. Total bedlam would unfurl, where a second before there had been nothing. And, if my memory holds(?!), in the nothing was the time my body&mind stopped agitating and I felt happily, calmly myself.

Back then everything was a bit of a blur. I remember how quickly I moved through life's situations, filling up every space, becoming a diversionary tactic by dancing on bars/on pool tables/on top of cars (OK maybe just one car, once) putting on a show for others to watch so I didn't have to look too closely at myself, nor could anyone else see too deeply into me, cuz...gotta go, gotta move. the whirling dervish. Nothing was quiet, though I remember that I really yearned for some calm, some silence from the white noise. But having a mortal fear that the world would pass me by and/or I'd be forgotten, I kept moving. I'm thinking about this because of something a friend e-mailed me the other day having to do with this blog: "I always knew that the dancing on bars would lead to something more wholesome." And, yes, pole dancing somehow is a helluva lot more wholesome than what I was doing back in that day...

That was when my movement did not even pretend to make me whole, it was guaranteed to flame-out. Of course there were times that it was a blast, but once the smoke cleared, I'd usually feel like a pile of ashes. And I know I was holding my breath most of the time. I wouldn't blow on my internal fire for fear of it flaring up and consuming me. The suspense of what the next moment would bring seemed huge, and somehow breathing into it became a bit scary.

Today I'm really excited about breathing into not only the spaces in between, but every moment that happens. When the lights go down in the studio and it's my dance and I'm standing against the wall or kneeling on the floor, waiting, it's excruciating, this pause. But it's a sweet torture because I realize how much I can embrace this slowness, this wait. In the past when I've planned what will happen next, it never looks the way I think it will. Ever. So now I'm making peace with the whirling, the dervish. And it doesn't just happen in the darkened S studio. Yesterday in ballet class, the instructor came up to me during some barre work. He stood right in front of me, eyes full bore into mine and sternly commanded "Breathe." I actually smiled because it felt like every moment's theme is this. A little bit I thought, What in the hell is wrong with me that I don't actually perform the most basic of functions: the in- and outtake of air? But, if this constant reminder is what I need to exist in the spaces where my life happens, the things in between the next move, noise, touch, taste, scent, view, then I welcome it.

softly...gently

One of the most emotionally moving pieces of dance I saw this year was Lightfoot Leon's "Softly As I Leave You," performed by wife and husband team, Drew Jacoby and Rubinald Pronk. It's raw power is everything I look for in an emotional connection, whether on a stage or off (though if I had an experience like this in my regular-day life, my head might, literally, explode). A light focuses on Drew inside a wooden box on a bare stage. As she begins to move, she agitates against the boxes confines, lifting, banging, straining limbs, seeming to want to break down her surroundings. In the shadows, Rubinald is seen slowly creeping toward her. As he joins her, finally, inside their confinement I literally let out a gasp because the visceral yearning I felt for them to join each other was potent. So much so that I didn't mind he'd climbed inside her wooden box, rather than taking her out into a wider space. But then she slips away, out from under his grasp. And it's gutting in a way. She's gone, and where I thought I should be happy she now has space to move, I was instead absolutely rooting for her to get back in the box with him...
So much was relayed in these few intense moments of movement that I felt how words can so often fail...
(If you're a Facebook member, you can become a fan of theirs at Jacoby & Pronk and click on some of their amazing performances. Sadly, this particular piece is nowhere to be found on film...If no Facebook, then google or YouTube them. It's worth it.)

(but here are some words that do convey:)

Dance, when you’re broken open.
Dance, if you’ve torn the bandage off.
Dance in the middle of the fighting.
Dance in your blood.
Dance, when you’re perfectly free.
-Rumi

TWENTY(in)TEN(tions)

And so it begins, this new decade of possibilities abounding! My intentions for this year and beyond are to fully explore the landscape of my movement both inside and out, plus observe as many different kinds of dance moves as I can in the process.

One of my favorites of '09 was Karole Armitage's Itutu at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (that's her at right, and see link at bottom of post for a cool NYMagazine interview with her). As a woman who has for over three decades lived, and continues to live, what she loves: dance and choreography, she is a complete inspiration to me as someone following their bliss. Not to mention that at 55, she's effin' sexy and strong. After the performance, she came out on stage in these killer shoes (all spike heels with Choo-like angles) and a black sheath dress skimming her endless legs and exposing great, muscled arms. She moved across the stage with such a body confidence that it seemed to lift her off the ground, though not in a Look-At-How-Hot-I-Am strutting way, but more an I-Know-What-This-Body-Can-Do move. (You know the difference when you see someone seeming to be only a vehicle to carry the clothes on their back versus someone whose entire being is expressed inside out?) The cool thing was that she spoke about her choreography from a place that wasn't dance specific. She didn't name-check any techniques or movement terms, but instead talked about the flight pattern of birds and geography and stuff like that. I kept thinking, This is what it is to have lived and to use the experience of that life to inform what you love. From reading, from talking, from watching...when it all goes into what you love to do, even if it sometimes might resemble a hot mess, then so be it, you're courageous and fully in life.

This is my goal going into the newness: To live fearlessly, to try as many different steps, stretches, movements as I can from the top of the island, down and beyond to wherever that takes me shore to shore. Dance my way through the Ailey Extension class roster. Say Yes to sampling classes at other studios with my merry dance pals. Explore what other S teachers have to offer. And roll around in these moments. I'll see how my 48 years of being on the planet informs the movements I undertake. To sprinkle on my soul whatever Armitage-ian magic that she represents to me. I actually can't wait!
http://nymag.com/arts/classicaldance/dance/features/60280/

A right-on quote that my friend Lauren forwarded:

"Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It's quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure. You are thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn't at all. You can be discouraged by failure - or you can learn from it. So go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because, remember that's where you will find success." Thomas J. Watson, the founder of IBM

Beyond

Really. Seriously. This picture makes me feel as if I'm stretching for heaven upside down. I can actually feel the stretch in my hamstrings, back, arms, even toes and fingers, brain and soul when I look at this. It's a still from the movie La Danse, a most amazing film following the Paris Opera Ballet as they prepared for a recent season. My favorite choreographer featured is Wayne McGregor, and this is one move from his piece. What attracts me so much in his work is that the emotion and wonder for what the body can do isn't hidden, the sweat and elasticity it takes to achieve these movements isn't covered up at all by costumes. It's all out there. Look. See the tendons, the quiver. You can practically feel it coming off the stage.

My friend Becky, she of my merry band of dance luvuhs, suggested I keep a dance diary. Such a good idea, and after seeing this movie I scribbled something in it about how I was struck by the fact that I could see every one of the five senses being engaged with these dancers, and how I was completely transported by that connection. (Kind of the difference between seeing Showgirls and All That Jazz: while both have visible bruises all over their celluloid body, the former tries to hide them with glitter, while the latter gleefully pushes their purpleness in our face, an action I'll take any day.)

Connecting to the senses is something I've been struggling with recently in my own movement. I took a class with with an S teacher who was so prescient in reading my body that what she kept saying to me as I danced was Breathe! At one point she said Be Careful, and it took me aback. I thought, Well, yes, in fact I'm climbing up a pole, but I'm not going to fall.... After class as we talked, she explained what she'd meant: That in not breathing, I couldn't fully experience my senses and hence wasn't able to explore my movements. I was fleeing from my dance rather than wrapping around it. There was no touch for my hands and feet to feel the beauty of the floor or the pole (and we're not talking pointed toes here), my eyes (whether open or closed) were not seeing what was possible, my nose was not taking in the air to move me forward, my ears were not hearing the spaces in between the notes—the quiet and powerful spaces that speak as loudly as the bass and guitar, my mouth was not tasting the confidence that could come with all the pleasure of my movement. She was so right in that I've been running from the power in me, and as with everything I learn in the studio, these words resonate out into my whole life...the dance of my every day.