Birmingham, AL: COVID-19 Unfolding, Part 888: Learning to "Dance" in COVID Times

 

Lincoln University dance recital, Jefferson City, Missouri. April, 2010.

 Before COVID

Since my time in South Louisiana, dancing had comprised a significant portion of my physical exercise, bringing with it a lagniappe of deep pleasure and, often, joy. 

 

Onset of COVID

But in March 2020, while in Tucson, my dance practice plummeted from some to none when COVID-19 slammed that door shut. My body and spirit suffered from the separation.

As I readied for my Tucson departure, the dearth of dance opportunities for the foreseeable future threw up a big ol' DETOUR sign from my original first choice of New Orleans (dance! live music! youthful energy!), pivoting me from one set of destination goals to another, just as worthy.  

 

Living with COVID: A new "dance"

Happily, I have stumbled on a COVID-safe way to dance in Birmingham.

Tennis! 

I began weekly tennis lessons last month via the James Lewis Education and Tennis Foundation. Below is a story of the foundation, executive director and gifted coach, Rudy Lewis, and the foundation's inspiration: 

 

The lessons are outdoors, the skillful coaches wear masks (as do most of the students, including me), and only the coaches are allowed to touch the balls or other tennis paraphernalia with their hands. The coaches sanitize all of the balls and rental rackets prior to the lesson. The pro shop practices a variety of good COVID practices, as well.

I'd never have imagined it, but learning to play tennis feels exactly like learning to dance! (Albeit, with no music, alas.)

Tennis' dance requires me to learn:

• Signals from my opponent that tell me what their next move might be, such as their body's position, where they are on the court, and the angle of their racket
• My foot and hip placements in relation to my intermediary "partner," the net
• My foot movements as I position myself to respond to the ball
• What I choose to look at before, during, and after my response
  
• A graceful, confident completion of my stroke
• The angle of my racket ("open" or "closed")

You'll notice all of the above relates to me being, let's say, the "follow." This is because I haven't learned how to serve ("lead") yet.

There are even "dynamic" warm-up drills that translate directly to my fitness, flexibility, and dexterity for when dance returns, such as: 

• Carioca (zydeco!)
• Side shuffle
• "A" skips
  

At least during this honeymoon period, I am in love with tennis and its dance soul. 

Related posts

From South Louisiana

• Learning to Dance, Part 1: Solving for X
• Learning to Dance, Part 2: The Tao of Following
• Learning to Dance, Part 3: The Pause
• Learning to Dance, Part 4: Signals
• Learning to Dance, Part 5: Anticipation
• Learning to Dance, Part 6: It Takes a Village

From St. Louis

• Learning to Dance: Swing, Part 1:  Remember the Curve

 

Learning to Dance: Swing, Part 1: Remember the Curve

Swing, Toronto, Canada. Summer 2016.

One of my goals when I moved to Louisiana was to learn to dance. I wrote a series about my Louisiana dance-learning experience:

Learning to Dance, Part 1: Solving for X
Learning to Dance, Part 2: The Tao of Following
Learning to Dance, Part 3: The Pause
Learning to Dance, Part 4: Signals
Learning to Dance, Part 5: Anticipation

Swing, Toronto, Canada. Summer 2016.

When I moved to El Paso, I intended to learn salsa, and I made some attempts at getting into the dance scene, but it didn't happen.

One of my St. Louis goals was to learn swing dancing. This post inaugurates the story of my progress.

Via a meetup group I joined, I began weekly swing dance lessons at the Moolah Shrine in one of St. Louis' bajillion cities that cluster around actual St. Louis: Creve Coeur. Or maybe Maryland Heights. Or Bridgeton. It's a toss-up.

West County Swing Dance Club hosts the Tuesday-night dance, which includes an hour-long lesson before the dance begins. There are different lesson groups, which range from beginner to advanced.

I began at Level 1: Beginner. In fact, I did three weeks at the beginner level before moving on to Level 2, which is where I am as I write this post.

Swing, Toronto, Canada. Summer 2016.

On learning swing, I am re-learning lessons I thought I knew, both in dance and life:

Learning a new dance means making mistakes, looking stupid, feeling lost, feeling impatient with myself. I must remind myself that this is normal. I'm supposed to make mistakes, look stupid, and feel lost. I don't need to feel impatient with myself. Instead, I must remember the cardinal rule of dance: Have fun!

My tendency to move too quickly, to forget the importance of the pause - the importance of letting a process unfold rather than push toward the destination, to relax into the moment, to savor the act - remains.

Learning to Dance, Part 6: It Takes a Village

Cowboy Symposium, Ruidoso, New Mexico.

Lessons are good and even practicing steps in front of a mirror are good. But it takes a village to teach a dancer.

A sampling of native, transplant, and visiting villagers in South Louisiana who have helped me learn how to dance:

Agnes C.
Bailey
Barbara
Bev
Brian M.
Charles R.
Dale N.
Dennis W.
Dick
Dolan
Doug from the Blue Moon
Doug Mc
Francois
Frank S.
Geoff R. 
Hannah B.
Harold ("Fred")
Jay M. ("and then there was a beautiful breeze")
Jeff B.
Jim
Joe
John D.
John R.
Kathleen Mc
Kay W.
Jacques ("shall we do the same ol' shit again?")
Leon
Moriba
Mike H.
Paul S. ("1, 2, 3, 4. ...1, 2, 3, 4")
Ray H.
Sonny
Ted C.
The Other Ted, the one who dances with that other woman from Missouri
Theresa I.
T.J. L.
Tony L.
Wayne
Wilfred K. 



Thank you.


Related posts:

Learning to Dance, Part 1: Solving for X
Learning to Dance, Part 2: The Tao of Following
Learning to Dance, Part 3: The Pause
Learning to Dance, Part 4: Signals
Learning to Dance, Part 5: Anticipation

Learning to Dance, Part 5: Anticipation

Lincoln University dance recital, April 2010. Jefferson City, Missouri.

When it comes to ketchup and romantic trysts, anticipation is a good thing. It's not so good in the context of dance.

When I "anticipate" in dance, it means that I take a dance step that I think will correspond to what my dance lead will do in the next moment.

Anticipation is a well-meaning attempt of a new dancer to:

1. Avoid making a mistake; and
2. Paradoxically, follow well. 

Notwithstanding the good intentions, anticipation is a bad habit. Anticipation is an attempt to control the unknown. It's about living in the future and not in the moment. It's about making assumptions about your partner, which may not be true. It's about trying to get into the head of another person and, in the process, losing touch with one's own thoughts and feelings, the flow of the music, and the physicality that's happening in the now.

When I refrain from anticipation, I sharpen my dance skills because I am forced to pay closer attention to signals from my partner. Because I let go of my illusion of control, I am freer to get inside the music and to feel the physical interplay between me, my partner, and the music. I accept that I will make mistakes.



Related posts: 

Learning to Dance, Part 1: Solving for X
Learning to Dance, Part 2: The Tao of Following
Learning to Dance, Part 3: The Pause
Learning to Dance, Part 4: Signals

Learning to Dance, Part 4: Signals

RR crossing, Lordsburg, New Mexico.

As the follow in a partner dance, I need to catch the lead's signals so I know what he intends to do next or what he wants me to do next.

As a novice dancer, it is common for me to misinterpret or miss a signal.

Sometimes I smile when I think about dance signals because it puts me in the mind of a horse and a rider. An equestrian gives the slightest physical cues to a horse, such as a bit of leg pressure on a horse's flank or pressure on both sides at once, or a subtle lead on the reins - all to ask the horse to turn to the left or right, or to move into a higher speed, or back up or move forward. 

Sharing this analogy with a dance partner could lead to a whole other category of signals, so I just keep it to myself.

This way. Highway 3. New Mexico.

The Mystery of the Right Hand  

In October, I was dancing with an out-of-town partner - let's call him Jacques - and in the midst of a dance, he suddenly said, "What, are you afraid of where my hand is going to go?"

In my rapid-fire wit, I said, "What?"

Jacques said, "You're grabbing my hand and moving it."

I said, "What?"

He repeated his statement, and I said, "What are you talking about? I'm not doing that."

Jacques assured me that this was exactly what I was doing.

I proposed that he tell me when it happened again so I can try and figure out the deal.

Presently, he did. And then I understood.

It was a signal mix-up on my end. When we were dancing in an open position, sometimes Jacques would put his right palm up and I knew that meant we would begin to dance with our hands held, but still in an open position. Other times, when we were dancing in the open position, he would move his right hand toward me, but NOT with his palm facing me. I hadn't put it together yet that when Jacques did this, it meant we would dance in a closed position, with his right hand on my left shoulder blade and my left hand on his right bicep or on his right shoulder blade. So what would happen is that - often - when I saw Jacques' right hand come up, I thought we were going to dance with hands held, but in an open position. Therefore, I would mistakenly grasp his hand while he was in the process of trying to put it around me and onto my left shoulder blade.

Consequence: We both jumped to inaccurate conclusions based on the misinterpretation of physical signals, me on the basis of inexperience and Jacques on the basis of a past experience with a dance partner who did accuse him of cheekiness.



A Brain Shift


A day or so later, I danced again with Jacques, this time in a different dance venue.

About halfway through the event, I noticed that Jacques began to execute a new-to-me hand signal. We had been dancing with both of our hands connected, but in an open position. He disengaged his right hand from my left, and flicked his partially-closed right hand toward his right. Jacques' movement had the appearance of a careless toss of junk mail that you're flipping over to a counter.

Somehow, I understood this was a signal for me to turn to my left, and I laughed and joked, "I guess the honeymoon is over," editorializing on the apparent carelessness, the laziness - the taking-for-grantedness - of the gesture.

Even though my teasing was truly in fun, it did reflect my limited knowledge of signals. You see, in previous dance lessons and subsequent real-life practice, I knew what it looked like when a lead dancer wanted me to turn right when we were in a one-hand-held, open position - he made an extended sweep of his left hand, almost pointing me in the direction he wanted me to go.  I hadn't yet been exposed to the movement Jacques made with his right hand.

Jacques took the teasing in stride, without comment, and it wasn't until later the same night or maybe at a different venue altogether, that I noticed exactly the same gesture made by other lead dancers.

And do you know, once I realized this was a signal used and recognized by experienced dancers, things recalibrated in my brain with the result that I saw it in an entirely new light - as a smooth, studied move and not a casual, careless one.

Now, isn't that something? That brain shift?



Related links: 

Learning to Dance: Solving for X
Learning to Dance: The Tao of Following
Learning to Dance: The Pause

Learning to Dance: The Pause

Dancing La Marinera in Tularosa, New Mexico. San Francisco de Paula Festival 2013.

Last year, at the Feed 'n Seed, I danced with an older gentleman. A slow-ish song. About 30 seconds into our dance, he said quietly in my ear, "Slow down, we're not in a hurry to go anywhere."

This centered me right then, and for the rest of the dance, I could be in the moment with where my partner was going and which rhythm line of the song he was choosing.

Holi Festival 2014, Lafayette, Louisiana.

Earlier in the year, before the Feed 'n Seed experience, at a Vermilionville Bal du Dimanche, a woman generously tutored me on a zydeco movement. I had taken zydeco lessons a month or so before, and I'd learned a basic zydeco shuffle in which every beat of the eight-count in zydeco was accounted for with a step or tap. But this woman was showing me something different. I didn't see the eight counts in her steps, I couldn't replicate her movements, and it confounded me.

I asked her about the step count, and she said - bless her generous heart - "don't worry about counting, just move with the music." I couldn't do anything with that information, so I asked her to keep demonstrating her steps until I could solve the mystery. She graciously complied.

Finally, I saw it.

On the third and seventh steps, she PAUSED. The fourth and eighth step were there, but "silent." Ohhhhhh.

When I excitedly shared my newfound understanding, the woman looked a little puzzled, and then shrugged, as if to say "whatever," apparently not excited as I about my tremendous breakthrough in understanding. I'm guessing she had so internalized her step movements, she didn't even notice the pause, and thus didn't think to explain it.

Feed n Seed, Lafayette, Louisiana.

These two experiences planted seeds in my neonatal dance mind, but they didn't stick until I took a new round of zydeco dance lessons this month.

The instructor informed me several times that I was going through movements too quickly. He EXPLICITLY directed me to pause. He hammered these points when I struggled to make turns correctly, so that I'd finish on the right foot at the right beat.

Finally, I got it. I have to PAUSE when I take that first turn-step.

The pause makes all the difference.

There is a maturity, an elegance, a sensuality, in the dance pause.

It's gratification delayed, it's listening and feeling, it's a breath.



Related posts: 

Learning to Dance: Solving for X
Learning to Dance: The Tao of Following

Learning to Dance: The Tao of Following

Crawfish Festival 2014, Breaux Bridge, Lousiana.

Two of my goals for my Louisiana sojourn have been to:

1. Learn to dance; and then 
2. Go out and do it.

It's now been about  year and a half since I took my first dance lessons (Cajun, Zydeco, and line dancing) and here's where I am:


On following:

There are pleasures in following that I did not anticipate, especially for a recovering control freak like me:

• I'm not the driver; my partner is. I don't have to worry about what's behind us or around us, that's my partner's job. I can relax into the process - physically and mentally - in the trust that he's going to get us around the dance floor safely and smoothly.  And when the occasional fender bender occurs, oh well, all I need to do is smile and shrug and keep on moving. 

• There is a beauty in being fully mindful of only the moment I am in, so I can feel my partner's cues about what we will do in the next moment. I have to work at this because it is easy to become distracted and for me to lose that connection. It can also be tempting to try and anticipate my partner's next move, which means I am living in a future moment that may or may not be real, and it disrupts the fluidity of the present. 

• I adore roller coasters.  The physical rush of controlled danger, of g forces, of going up and down and around. A lead partner who knows how to facilitate the twirls and turns and spin-outs - as the follower, it is like being on a roller coaster. A head rush. 

On the fear of being observed and judged by others while I'm dancing

Whereas this form of self-consciousness would have been paralyzing before Louisiana, somehow it disappeared early on in my Louisiana dance quest. Seriously. There have been a number of times where a dance partner and I are the only couple on a dance floor and I don't even think about it. Some reasons why this is true flows from my role as the follower:

1. My dance partner obviously has the confidence to be half of a sole couple on the dance floor, and I take on the cloak of that confidence. 
2. As a new dancer, I am so focused on what my partner is doing that I have no brain space left to worry about onlookers. To do my part as a follower, I need to stay fully in the moment. 
3. And part of it is a choice that is similar to that made by Cheryl Strayed (author of Wild) when she decided to walk the Pacific Crest Trail - she had to tell herself that she did not fear mountain lions, bears or rattlesnakes or else she couldn't have embarked on the walk. I had to let go of self-consciousness about my dancing in order to achieve my goal. This was big-big because there was a time when jumping out of a plane was less scary than dancing.

Crawfish Festival 2014, Breaux Bridge, Lousiana.

Monogamous versus polyandrous dancing

Monogamous

Monogamous dance couples can practice steps and routines together, blend their rhythms, experiment with new steps or timing or patterns, and develop what can be a moving art form on the dance floor, a joy to watch. Even monogamous couples who are unvarying in their dance styles can demonstrate through their body language the pleasure they derive from dancing together.

A downside, of course, is that a monogamous dance couple can become stagnant to the point where one partner feels desirous of new moves - some spice - whilst the other wants to stay in his comfort zone.   

Crawfish Festival 2014, Breaux Bridge, Lousiana.

Polyandrous

A woman without a regular dance partner must become polyandrous.

Benefits of multiple lead partners for new dancers:

• Practice in how to stay present so I can go with the lead's flow
• Practice in how to stay present so I can avoid trying to anticipate the lead's next move, which gets me into trouble
• Constant exposure to new moves (originally I wrote "constant learning of new moves," but see re: geometry in Learning to Dance: Solving for X.)
• Regular receipt of feedback that promotes improvement 
• Regular receipt of feedback that promotes acceptance of feedback in this and other areas of my life ("acceptance" doesn't necessarily mean agreement; it means receiving without pushing back) 
• Once I know a particular dancer's moves, then I know what to expect, therefore, there is some predictability (in a good sense), resulting in less stress for me as the follower

Disadvantages of multiple dance partners for new dancers:

• A new lead brings the great unknown, which is a little anxiety-producing
• Conflicting feedback from different partners on best practices, which can cause consternation to a new dancer - at first. (Over time, however, I've learned to take what I want [or that I am ready for], and leave the rest.)

Crawfish Festival 2014, Breaux Bridge, Lousiana.

My favorite dance partners

The best dance partner is not necessarily the most knowledgeable or the most skilled. He doesn't necessarily have the greatest number of moves, or the showiest. 

My favorite partners are those who:

• Are such skillful prompters in their lead role that they make me appear to be a far more accomplished dancer than I am. They even make me feel more accomplished than I am.

• Dance because it's fun and that's what they care about for themselves and for their partners. When I mess up, they don't give one shit about that - they are dancing for the joy and they want me to have joy, too.

• During a slow dance, they dance slow. Some leads like to dance fast to a slow song. Slow is sexier.

Learning to Dance: Solving for X

A friend said to me once: Every day is solving for x.

It certainly is the case in my quest to learn how to dance in South Louisiana.

My experience of dance (and other patterns of movement such as t'ai chi) is that it is a form of geometry.

The definition of geometry is: "from the Ancient Greek:  geo- "earth", -metron "measurement") [and] is a branch of mathematics concerned with questions of shape, size, relative position of figures, and the properties of space."

There's a blank space in my brain in regard to geometry. I don't have a good sense of direction. Line graphs are a head-scratcher. Distance and length estimations - wild-ass guesses. 

When dance partners sometimes say, "no worries! just go with the beat! don't count the steps!" this is well-meaning, but it's not actionable information. For people like me, we've got to break it down, see how it's built, and then see if we can replicate it with our spatially-challenged limbs and joints. Eventually, we'll get it, given enough practice, but we are remedial students. 

There are several line dances currently popular that involve a lot of turning AND heel-toe, chacha, or rock step action, plus some hopping bits that paralyze my brain cells. Helpful people - and they really are! - call out the steps while we're doing it, point their arms in the direction I need to go, and so on, but sadly, this only adds more stimuli to a brain that is already in cascade-fail mode. These sainted South Louisianans, who only want me to succeed, have no idea that below is how my neurons interpret their information:

Credit: Amplify

So between you and me, sometimes I have to just tune them out. Please don't say anything.

Having said all of the above, things have gotten better in the year and a half I've now been here. Some steps I can do with confidence, others middling so, and others remain (for now) an algorithmic teaser that I hope to some day master.

It's all worth it, though.  With dance comes joy.