Dancing in the Age of Now
Written by Leyla Najma
Dancing in
the age of now is a question that has been on my mind for quite awhile. The
best statement I can remember hearing is from the legendary Bert Balladine,
"You have nothing to dance about until you are over the age of 30." I
didn’t understand this statement years ago but I sure do now. It hits home and
has made itself comfy as the years have come and gone. Each year has given me a
gift of introspection and wisdom that has occasionally felt like a reprimand
but I’m old enough now to place it where it needs to go. Life’s lessons aren’t about taking to heart
the little inconsequential things; it’s about seeing the big and understanding
where we are in the scope of things.
I think as
dancers, we should step back from ourselves and see who we are in the moment.
Is the image in front of us, what we imagined years ago? Every experience in
dance is an unexpected roller coaster ride which makes it so exhilarating.
Today I realize that I love to go forward and twirl around but going backwards
makes my stomach queasy. Women can be the cat’s meow or the cat’s claw
depending on individual perspectives that might be skewed to begin with.
Learning how to release pent up issues and emotions has been a learning experience
for me. I’ve dealt with a few curve balls in the last three years so I learned
to play the game in a way that makes catching curve balls more fun then being
hit by them.
Dancing in
the age of now isn’t something that I have done very well. Dealing with myself
on a daily basis is really like dealing with a full time drama queen. I
understand me but after awhile I get tired of dealing with what I am versus
what I was. So I wanted to talk about being in a place of comfort that has no
regrets or misgivings regarding life…yeah right. If my age was a person she
would be a confident and experienced woman. So I wonder why I want to be
younger with less of both? Just because we age doesn’t mean we get any smarter.
My youth has this lingering effect of giving the illusion that good times are
only associated with her. What’s crazy is I believe her sometimes.
Dancing in
the age of now isn’t always easy to explain. I often think about when dancers
ask me how do I know how to place moves together to create a choreography. It
has always been a tough question for me to answer because through trial and
error, I’ve learned to hear what the music is telling me. What I hear, I
express through movements, gestures and traveling steps. How could I tell my
daughter how to walk when she was one year old? She had to learn to pace
herself and place her weight in a way that allowed for her to take those first
steps. Once she learned to place each foot in front of the other, she was
running! The lesson is about feeling what’s inside instead of waiting to be
shown how to do something. Following what we know to do isn’t always easy in a
world that tells us what we should be doing.
Let’s be
honest here, being in a place of comfort for women really isn’t possible. I can
hang in my pajamas and watch a movie and be comfortable but that’s not exactly
what I’m talking about. Can I walk out of the house without make-up…no. Would I
let my grey hair come out naturally…hell no! So comfort isn’t something that is
naturally apart of a woman’s mindset. High heels, diets, wrinkle creams and
everything else that goes into a woman’s daily regimen of creating herself has
nothing to do about comfort. But in a very unconventional way it’s a comfort in
itself. It’s really not fair because we get to wear vibrant, sexy and bold
clothes along with make-up and bling. We can do so much with our hair and make
a statement with it up or down. I think that’s why men don’t mind what we go
through to be beautiful; they get to see the end results of our laborious
efforts. So who is the smarter of the sexes…women of course!
Dancing in
the age of now is kind of like a diary showing us our idiosyncrasies. We never stop being who we are; we just
become better impersonators of ourselves. I wonder if I really knew what I was
like would I want to be my friend? I think this would be a good question for
anyone to ask themselves.
So my
opine is pretty simple. It’s not just about accepting myself; it’s about
understanding who I am. At this point I feel like I’m back home in my old room
sifting through memories, they all lead up to me. As a Simone DeBeauvoir quote
states quite well, “One is not born a woman, one becomes one.”
