On Dance
I expected this site to be overrun with writing about my daughter. I’ve seen it happen many times on other sites. But it never happened here. In fact, nothing happened here.
For more than a year, since the month before her birth, nothing. I felt guilty about it. Shouldn’t I be overflowing with things to share? Young parents all around me have the obnoxious gusto of the born-again, and they talk themselves hoarse about their children.
And I know that they do not feel more intensely than I. We experience the same joys; the same small elations at lifting and sipping, the same little heartbreaks at bumps and rashes and goodbye. The hard things I have been through only provide greater context. My past only pushes the present into bolder relief.
Last night Finch began to dance.
We were waiting for pototes to bake and listening to Roseanne Cash (wink) and the groove worked its way into Finch’s head. This she began to bob, and then she began to dip at the knees. She’s been walking for about two weeks, so she was plenty uncertain on her feet, but it was unmistakable dancing. Janine and I, eager to reinforce Finch’s rhythmic ducking, took to our feet as well, and the whole little family danced.
Now, lest I misrepresent the event, let my clarify that I am not now nor have I ever been a dancer. Janine can dance remarkably well, and sweet little Finny is unencumbered by self-consciousness. So I am confident that I was the worst dancer on the living room floor last night. Happily, the attention of a toddler is fleeting, so it didn’t go on too long.
So, why, three paragraphs into a piece about how I never share thing with the same enthusiasm as other young parents have I paused to recount this anecdote? It supports my next point, okay?
As I seem to have to learn over and over again, the kind of writing I do here is introspective, and that makes this site not an outlet for my thoughts and feelings but an inlet; a place I come to discover what what I am thinking about and how I feel.
But this past year I’ve had no time—scratch that—no need for that. I know what I am thinking about: my wife and baby daughter. I know what I’m feeling.
And so, last night, I had no need for introspection. There was nothing to mull. I just got up and danced. Really badly.
I praise the dance, for it frees people
from the heaviness of matter and binds the isolated to community.
I praise the dance, which demands everything:
health and a clear spirit and a buoyant soul.
Dance is a transformation of space, of time, of people,
who are in constant danger of becoming all brain, will, or feeling.
Dancing demands a whole person,
one who is firmly anchored in the center of his life,
who is not obsessed by lust for people and things
and the demon of isolation in his own ego.
Dancing demands a freed person,
one who vibrates with the equipoise of all his powers.
I praise the dance.
O man, learn to dance,
or else the angels in heaven will not know what to do with you.
Saint Augustine
