The Dancer Within
Lately,
I went to a Knicks game with Aubs and my dad. That adorable tyke was rooting against the knicks and every time they scored he’d be like oh darn it!!!!!!! and make a hilarious face. I had never been to a Knicks game and I thought it was pretty fun. I liked how before it started they played some ominous music, the lights in madison square garden flashed red and then black. Then the knicks dancers came on with torches (electric) and did some sexy pagan dance. It got good for a second there! Then they turned the lights on, that game started, and it got a bit more boring! I loved the knicks kids dancers— they were adorable and so cute. The regular knicks dancers were kind of boring. I feel like the choreography was not that great.
I watched a documentary on Netflix called “Gotta Dance” about this team of senior citizen hip hop dancers for the nets.
It followed them around through the auditions, their subsequent instant fame and success. I recommend it, very engrossing. The most interesting person was Betty/Betsy—a typical elderly teacher who was passionate about teaching kids. IN her class she wore teacherly garments—long skirts…long sweaters. But within lay a dancer…a hip hop sexy dancer dying to get out. Everyone called her Betsy but she auditioned as a Betty, saying to herself “Betsy would never get up in front of a crowd and do hip hop, but maybe “Betty” would.” Betty was probably a name like Vicky back in the day—the cheerleader version of Victoria. Whenever they showed her in the documentary her name was shown as “Betsy/Betty”. Throughout the film, Betty became the leader of the group, asking for more revealing feminine outfits, loving the idea of dancing hop hop in front of thousands, and going on a shopping trip with her friends from dance class to buy new clothes that “Betty” could feel sexy in. Eventually Betty and Betsy merged in a scene that showed Betsy teaching an educational hip hop song and dance routine she made up to her second grade students: “get down. and down with put downs!”
This may seem silly, but I think it shows something profound about life. For almost all the elderly people on the seniors dance team, it came out in the docu they had loved to dance and wanted to dance their whole life. There were dancers locked within. That is kind of sad to me…bittersweet I guess. They finally got a chance to dance but so many people have dancers within and never get the chance to dance. First of all dancing is considered something for young people. or thin people. But anyone can dance. And size has nothing to do with dancing. My favorite blogger Ragen of Danceswithfat is a national champion dancer at around 280 lbs.
I have gone through a similar experience as Betty/Betsy. Once I started to dance I felt different. I guess I just feel really proud of myself. If you feel you have a dancer within then you need to dance. You will see that your need to dance or your love of dancing makes you naturally talented, because art is an expression and outlet for our inner urges. You will make art. You will make art out of everything within you that needs to come out and be expressed. You will experience the act of being creative—where there is no wrong or right, only what your body and mind tells you to do. And everyone who sees you will appreciate it and be awed by it.
How did I find this? How did I get so lucky. Whatever you have within you, you have to bring it out. If you have a hidden dancer within, you need to start dancing. The more you love it and the more you FEEL it, the more of a natural you will be at it.
It reminds me of a quote I love and put in Picture Stories Volume 3” IF you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” This is so true. The need will go unmet and it will burn you from the inside out. If you do bring it out, the fact that the urge was so strong will be the very thing that makes it powerful and transcendent.
I love dancing. When I dance I feel my eyes open and my mind calm down. I feel like I can look someone straight in the eye, without fear, like I can when I am sufficiently drunk, except your mind is clear too, empty, open, experiencing, accepting. I feel powerful, strong and healthy-like a pillar of health, health radiating from me, i feel free to be my true self and do literally anything i want to do for once. i feel different, like I am someone else, but someone I knew I’d become before in my life…I’d seen her in glimpses but mostly through the eyes of my boyfriend. I’d never understood her, where she came from. But now I accept that is a wonderful part of me that is a gift given to me, and one that every woman in the world is given. It’s so ironic because I struggled against girly things and being too feminine my whole life—now I realize it is like not being able to accept a compliment. Every woman gets to have power over men in a certain way. Accept it and say thank you.
I feel it has given me confidence. I feel I am not a second rate kind of girl, someone who is not hot enough to attract any attention or love, but someone who is unique and who a certain kind of guy would appreciate and would be lucky to date. I feel S Factor has taught me that which is why I tell everyone to do it. No takers yet ha.
