Hyperreal

Had a wee practice session with some folks today, helping me identify the wheat from the chaff of my dancing, and then hopefully finding a way to sort it!

My chaff can be summarised as I’m doing bad things with my hands and feet… and legs… and arms.

My wheat is that the rest of me seems to be doing OK, and even the bits of me that are sometimes doing bad things aren’t doing it all the time. In fact, sometimes they are doing quite good things.

I’m not a dancer, and after only 3 months trying to be one, it’s not a surprise that my body doesn’t fit naturally into a dancer’s style. In fact, over the course of my life, my body’s got used to having an easy life, I rarely push it, I don’t give it enough exercise and I shouldn’t expect it to immediately just to my command now. But I’m going to see what this old bod can do, it’s surprised me before and maybe I can surprise it.

Things I particularly need to work on include relaxing myself, letting my shoulders go a little, and getting my legs to bend a bit more.

I need to stop sticking my toes up in the air on step backs – in fact in pretty much every part of the dance I need to be more on my toes and balls of my feet and less on the heels.

Although I’ve been told I’ve got a nice gentle lead I sometimes need to make it more assertive. Especially for things like leads on a girl’s hip. This is going to be difficult. I don’t do physical contact well with women I don’t know really well.

On the other side of all this negativity are some good things. For example, I have a few good moves that I can do rather well, I can make a good connection with my partner, and I’m not doing too bad at dancing to the music.

So a few things to bask in, a few things that need practice. All and all, it was a useful exercise, it was fun, and I hope I’m on my way to becoming a better dancer as a result.

Now I’m wondering whether to go to both JJ’s on Tuesday and the GUU on Wednesday. I’m willing to practice: I’m wanting to practice: I’m waiting to practice. (With apologies to G.B. Shaw.)

Thanks to the wonderful folks who helped me, and thanks to you for reading and maybe leaving a comment below…

See you on the dance floor…