So She Dances

I met a woman last night at a dance workshop with whom, within 30 seconds of our introduction, I’d had a more sensual experience than I’ve had with some lovers. The entire encounter lasted less than a minute.

Pause.

Now that you’re done being clever, I’m referring to dance. As a friend of mine put it, “If both partner’s are open to it, dance is just social sex. Just as erotic.” It was the right few bars of the right song with the right person in the right moment. I wish I knew the song. We weren’t doing any kind of complicated expression, movement, or pattern. Simply working on some advanced techniques in our basic patterns. She wasn’t the most attractive woman in the room, but the connection, personality, and sensation of that brief experience took my attraction to her quite above and beyond.

It wasn’t a fluke either. We danced again later and while there were many follows (women), there that I enjoyed dancing with who were either excellent, lovely, a pleasure to dance with or some combination of the three, as I told her, I have rarely had so much fun dancing with someone. In fact, my only disappointment of the entire evening was when she turned into Cinderella while I was dancing and disappeared before I could get a chance to bid her au revoir.

We danced five or six times over the course of the evening dance, yet that was still a small part of an incredible day. I went to a West Coast Swing dance workshop with a professional dancer named Michael Kielbasa. That’s this guy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjNHhoFiMqM

The workshop started at noon and went until 5 with about a half hour break for food and a few short rests during which most people danced. The workshop focused on doing more advanced techniques within basic patterns and then broke from 5-6. At 6 he put on a basic class for an hour after which a dance ran from 7-10. I intentionally sat out one song for the duration of the dance, and missed bits and pieces of others, but more or less stayed on the floor until I left. I’m one of those people who maintain energy by remaining in motion. If I stop to rest, I succumb to inertia.

I am so sore today, and pretty tired, but in a good way. The workshop was about an hour and 45 minutes from my house, so I didn’t get home and to bed until almost midnight. It was totally worth it. I’ve definitely been missing every part of the event in my life. Learning, improving, the community, the smiles of a follow who is having fun, the kind of people who love to dance, the movement, the use of my body, the interaction, and the dancing itself. It’s also been a long time since I slept so deeply and well, to be entirely honest. Eight hours of dancing and two Aleve will do that to you, I suppose.

There are auditions tonight for a play that I had intended to take part in, but I no longer want to. As I mentioned earlier last month, I want to dance more, and yesterday just reminded me how much more. That is my world, there. I belong around dancers and on a dance floor. It is the paradigm most suited to my personality. I have no compunction about looking like an idiot on the dance floor, which apparently translates into “cool little extra moves,” as I heard expressed by a couple of follows last night.

I had taken a break from theatre to raise my puppy and intended to get back into it this spring. I think however that I’m going to keep my time free to attend dance events and put together the teen dance team I agreed to teach. I think that will create a better balance in my life. After all, the puppy still needs raising and attention, though I definitely need to get out and do the things that I’m passionate about as well. I am passionate about dance. Not so passionate about acting. It’s just something that gets me out there and comes naturally.

While I imagine there’s plenty more in there for me to say about how much I enjoyed Sunday, it’s not coming bubbling to the surface. It was a very full but fully enjoyable weekend and something I badly needed. It’s amazing how we forget how much we love the things that make happy when we let them slip out of our lives for a while, whether through inconvenience or whatever else life puts in our way. But those people, and that passion, that’s what I want to be around. If it continues to be such a challenge while located where I am, perhaps I’ll have to consider moving on. It’s a pity most places with strong dance scenes are cities.

Enough for now. Be well.

-m0rg4n