Dance

On Friday night, the curtains went up and I was sat in the Colliseum Theatre watching Swan Lake. It was my first time watching the ballet but it felt more like a really hazy distant memory. Like a sap, I welled up within in the first few seconds of it starting. The music, the set, the tutus, the sequences and more than anything, the Snow Queen blew me away.

It got me thinking about my own dancing hang-ups. I've always loved dancing, I wanted to go to classes when I was little but never had the opportunity. Instead, I would make up my own choreography in my bedroom and dance everyday to my favourite songs. As I got older, I danced less often and well, life got in the way. I stopped excercising altogether until I took up yoga later on, the only other thing that resonated. My body wants to be flexible, graceful and strong in the legs but that all got hindered when I got these nerve problems in my feet, rendering me unable to even walk barefoot around the house.

For 6 years, they've stopped me from doing what I want to and to avoid stepping on painful flooring, I've forgotten what it's like to feel all that energy in my legs and strength in my movements. After a healing session over a week ago, I was told that it is possible for the nerves to regenerate and with some dedication, my feet can be healed. And so my reaction was to scout for an adult beginners ballet class. I've found just the perfect thing, I've found the perfect shoes and soon I'll take my inner child to a dance class and heal my adult self. My legs seem to know it's coming, they're wanting to stretch and bend more in anticipation.

About 3 years ago, I wrote a poem about a dream I had, and it feels more close to me now than it did at the time:

Past Life

I twirled and twirled on my toes

in another time, on another plane.

That floor was mine upon which

I could prance and swish, no longer a wish.

I wore ballerina shoes, soft pink

and spectators were there I think, watching me

I could bend and hop, my body was free to feel

each move, such grace.

Not sure which country or place but I was there

and it was me and I was dancing, spinning like so.

A ballerina I was, a long time ago.