Tonight I spent some time uploading videos from my ipad to youtube so I’d have access to them from wherever I am. And no, you can’t watch them! They’re private – my work and practice product. (And, I’m a little embarrassed of them.) But the truth is, it’s not much different from something I might do in a corner at a blues dance or even in a competition.
In this particular video, I’m dancing to Bessie Smith’s, “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love.” It’s jazzy and sweet and when I watch myself, I see the child in me – the little girl who dreamed of being a dancer, who dressed as a tap dancer for Halloween when she was eight, the girl who jumped up at the end of the Nutcracker and started doing pirouettes when she was nine.
What amazes me is how confident I feel as a solo dancer, and yet how silly I feel that I look in this video… a little girl doing twirls and waving her hands around, tilting her head and smiling knowingly… I was burlesque dancer from an alarmingly young age.
Even though I’m hardly a child anymore, I can’t envision myself as an old person and I hope to god that even though I feel silly watching this vieo, I can maintain this sense of youthfulness as long as I’m dancing. And when I can’t dance anymore, I don’t think I want to live.
