I pin things here.
I write short things here.
My author page is here.
My photos are here.
I talk about books here.
Thursday
Jun142007
It's kinda funny, if you look at it in the right way...
June 14, 2007
I woke up this morning feeling like a truck hit me in the night, when I was sleeping in my bed, next to Chinua. I swear, some trucker lost his way. Or maybe it's just a headache, brought on by the allergies that plague me night and day. Or maybe I spent too much time in the sun yesterday, and didn't drink enough water. (Drink water, everyone! Your body needs it!)Â
When I wrote my last post, Renee and I were sitting in my favorite little cafe in the tiny town to the north of us, ready to drive out to an even tinier town, west of the tiny town, for our dance class with the teacher we adore. I think I feel the same way about her that I felt about my kindergarten teacher. I remember being all five years old with my knobby knees and unruly hair and missing teeth and- Oh how I loved my beautiful kindergarten teacher. She was so BEAUTIFUL. I really have no idea what she looked like. But she was LOVELY.  My dance teacher is over fifty and one of the most beautiful women that I have ever met. On the way home, we always talk about two things. How the dancing went, and how much we admire our dance teacher. ("She's so nice... did you see her skirt today? She told me that I'm improving...")
Anyways, just so you know the extent of our strangeness. (Actually, where we are concerned, that is not even the tip of the iceburg, my friends.)
But a funny thing happened on this particular Monday evening, and it has taken me this long to recover from it enough to write about it. I started out in that funk, determined to sweat it out of me, not understanding why my skin felt like it wanted to crawl away from me or something. We began our stretching time, which is awesome, probably my favorite part of the evening, with the drums going in the background encouraging you to strrrreeeetttch that muscle just a little bit more, and then we lined up to dance. Now, there is only one place that I hate to dance in this class, and it's in the last line. Basically, we follow the teacher, dancing across the floor toward the drummers in lines of three, and then we walk back. Being in the last line equals being pinned to the dissection board to me, because everyone watches you while they wait to dance again, and since on this day I was feeling about as intelligent as a worm, I really didn't want to be in the last line. I just wanted to be swallowed up in the crowd.Â
This is also kind of an advanced class, and we are still beginners. So I fumbled, and I wobbled, and a couple of times I merely walked across the floor like cardboard (because, you know, cardboard walks) and I had a few breakthroughs, but somehow I managed to completely psyche myself out. The voice ranting in my head sounded something like this: Step step arm arm, no! Darn it, you are such a loser. Okay, step step arm arm, Oh my word, you are never going to be able to do this. You should be better than this, everyone is sneering at you, just look at their lips curling, wow, you look like a chicken more than a woman, how terribly clumsy and big you are.
Can you believe it?  What a terrible voice. It was no wonder that I started to get tears in my eyes, and then, as the teacher picked up on the fact that I was getting more and more distraught, she began to really slow down the steps just ahead of me so that I could catch it at my pace.  She encouraged me with signs to breathe, calm down, just follow her.  That's when I realized that I was going to break down completely. Obviously, the only thing to do was make a run for it!Â
So I bolted. I grabbed my stuff and walked out the door and cried my way across the gravel parking lot and up to the top of one of the beautifully rounded hills. I sat down in the tall grass and hid up there, watching the tips of the grasses above my head, listening to the drums that I could still faintly hear. I cried and cried, and wondered what, exactly, I was crying about. It couldn't be about dancing.Â
From my point at the top of the hill I could see for miles, rounded hill after rounded hill, boulders and trees and clefts. The light was beginning to fade, the sun had already set. I lay back in the grass and watched the swath of blue sky above me, listened to the bass pounding, and barely was able to calm down, despite all this calm around me. It was as though all the stillness could not seep into me, and I thought a lot about my whirling life these days, and how sometimes the smallest thing can trigger a rockslide, how maybe I've been waiting to cry.
Not being able to dance signifies a larger lack of ability that I feel, the crushing question, can I DO this? There are so many things whirling above our heads right now. We pray to pass through this with peace, with greater joy than before. But sometimes you just have to cry, you make a fool of yourself, you leave class, and you cry like a baby.
When I wrote my last post, Renee and I were sitting in my favorite little cafe in the tiny town to the north of us, ready to drive out to an even tinier town, west of the tiny town, for our dance class with the teacher we adore. I think I feel the same way about her that I felt about my kindergarten teacher. I remember being all five years old with my knobby knees and unruly hair and missing teeth and- Oh how I loved my beautiful kindergarten teacher. She was so BEAUTIFUL. I really have no idea what she looked like. But she was LOVELY.  My dance teacher is over fifty and one of the most beautiful women that I have ever met. On the way home, we always talk about two things. How the dancing went, and how much we admire our dance teacher. ("She's so nice... did you see her skirt today? She told me that I'm improving...")
Anyways, just so you know the extent of our strangeness. (Actually, where we are concerned, that is not even the tip of the iceburg, my friends.)
But a funny thing happened on this particular Monday evening, and it has taken me this long to recover from it enough to write about it. I started out in that funk, determined to sweat it out of me, not understanding why my skin felt like it wanted to crawl away from me or something. We began our stretching time, which is awesome, probably my favorite part of the evening, with the drums going in the background encouraging you to strrrreeeetttch that muscle just a little bit more, and then we lined up to dance. Now, there is only one place that I hate to dance in this class, and it's in the last line. Basically, we follow the teacher, dancing across the floor toward the drummers in lines of three, and then we walk back. Being in the last line equals being pinned to the dissection board to me, because everyone watches you while they wait to dance again, and since on this day I was feeling about as intelligent as a worm, I really didn't want to be in the last line. I just wanted to be swallowed up in the crowd.Â
This is also kind of an advanced class, and we are still beginners. So I fumbled, and I wobbled, and a couple of times I merely walked across the floor like cardboard (because, you know, cardboard walks) and I had a few breakthroughs, but somehow I managed to completely psyche myself out. The voice ranting in my head sounded something like this: Step step arm arm, no! Darn it, you are such a loser. Okay, step step arm arm, Oh my word, you are never going to be able to do this. You should be better than this, everyone is sneering at you, just look at their lips curling, wow, you look like a chicken more than a woman, how terribly clumsy and big you are.
Can you believe it?  What a terrible voice. It was no wonder that I started to get tears in my eyes, and then, as the teacher picked up on the fact that I was getting more and more distraught, she began to really slow down the steps just ahead of me so that I could catch it at my pace.  She encouraged me with signs to breathe, calm down, just follow her.  That's when I realized that I was going to break down completely. Obviously, the only thing to do was make a run for it!Â
So I bolted. I grabbed my stuff and walked out the door and cried my way across the gravel parking lot and up to the top of one of the beautifully rounded hills. I sat down in the tall grass and hid up there, watching the tips of the grasses above my head, listening to the drums that I could still faintly hear. I cried and cried, and wondered what, exactly, I was crying about. It couldn't be about dancing.Â
From my point at the top of the hill I could see for miles, rounded hill after rounded hill, boulders and trees and clefts. The light was beginning to fade, the sun had already set. I lay back in the grass and watched the swath of blue sky above me, listened to the bass pounding, and barely was able to calm down, despite all this calm around me. It was as though all the stillness could not seep into me, and I thought a lot about my whirling life these days, and how sometimes the smallest thing can trigger a rockslide, how maybe I've been waiting to cry.
Not being able to dance signifies a larger lack of ability that I feel, the crushing question, can I DO this? There are so many things whirling above our heads right now. We pray to pass through this with peace, with greater joy than before. But sometimes you just have to cry, you make a fool of yourself, you leave class, and you cry like a baby.
Reader Comments (12)
It sounds traumatic. I imagine that if I were in a complicated dance class, I would also have an inner critic ranting at me. I hope you find a way to quell that. Wishing you a wonderful dance class next time around.
And I understand that it's not about the dance class at all - but it is, at the same time. I think mothers will always have the curse of wanting to balance all the millions of things we have to do, with a graceful, elegant way about us. The kind of grace maybe that we see in beautiful dance instructors. It's the dance of life, afterall, and it's hard sometimes to admit that, although we want to do it all with style, sometimes those tears come. And they remind us that we need to simply crawl into the Father's arms...or something like that.
Thanks for sharing your heart.
Hey, I'm pretty certain that the responsibility for all of the things you feel whirling around isn't yours, and that you can let some of it go, maybe.
Sending you hugs.
Sweet Rae. Thanks for sharing. I often feel the same way--especially lately. While nothing major has happened, everything has happened. My cat of 15 years died 3 months ago, my cat of 14 years has cancer and will die soon, my friend's mother passed away, and my 4 year-old is asking me if she's going to die someday. I'm confronting death every day and find myself fearing it more and clinging to life more fiercely than ever. And it all boils down to "can we DO this?" And "are we doing it GOOD ENOUGH?"
That you cry and allow yourself to feel is a wonderful example of how strong you are. Stay connected and true to yourself.
It's true - sometimes we're so busy that we let things overwhelm us and build up and then it's like a dam breaks and it all comes out. But when it's tears that's the best way.
You are an amazing woman, you carry a full load, and you love well. You have many cares, but remember you don't have to carry them......
You are also extremely vulnerable - thanks for sharing!
Rae, I don't what it is with you, but what you wite resonates with me....I totally GET what you write. So thanks for putting into words the crazy storm that is my head sometimes.
oh rae, you hit on so many things i just get, really get. i have been in a class with my sis, an amazing w.a. dancer and felt so out of it, i have cried in the last few days, i have hated blogging but really loved it too, and it is all swirling around. i'll send you calming vibrations if you can spare to send some my way...sometimes it helps just knowing you are not alone. thank you for sharing.
Grief is a funny thing. It appears when we least expect it. Sometimes it dances along with us - quiet and compliant. Sometimes it wants the spotlight and no matter what we do it will not be silenced. But grief is not who we are it is just something we have to feel and when we let it have it's way for awhile we become strong enough to go back to the dance.
I can really relate to the feeling like there is an ocean behind your eyes and one false move, its coming out.
You are a really great writer.
I agree with Carrien. It's okay to let go.
So I took this inner healing class not too long ago at the Vineyard (our home church), and the teacher had us do something called the mirror exercise. We were to sit and stare at ourselves for 5 minutes, then write what we saw. I know we all have an inner critic, and I know who he is.
So I spent about 10 minutes tearing myself apart from stem to stern. Too fat, too ugly, your kids will be ashamed to be seen with you, etc. All childhood wounds that I've carried for a couple of decades.
The next assignment was to ask God what He sees when He looks at me in the mirror. And while I thought he would say something placating like any good friend would ("You're not ugly, you're lovely"), He said something profound. It rocked me. He said, "Ask yourself who is telling you those things. That heavy, black feeling in your chest isn't the Holy Spirit. Who wants you to feel ugly and useless? Only the one who knows what you are meant to become and fears you".
Wow. When He says things like that, how could anyone not love Him?
So to quote from "Captivating", "Your wounds have come to you from the one who knows what you are meant to become and fears you".
God bless. :)
Came to your site through Lifenut. It is lovely. You seem like a very interesting woman! I can so relate to this post. I often feeling like I am unraveling. I think it is the beautiful chaos of raising young children that does it to me. I just forget who I am sometimes. Glad to find your site!