he invariably joins in. dogga cannot just watch us dance. he stands on his strong aussie legs and joins with us. it is utterly one of the sweetest things. he’s like that with hugs, too. he wants to be a part of it.
since we love to dance together – even a few steps here and there – he has plenty of opportunities to watch (and join). we dance in the front yard, on the back deck, in the living room, in the kitchen. there is nothing like a slow dance to (literally) slow you down, tune you inside, make you feel like everything-is-going-to-be-ok in the world. maybe that’s why we’ve always danced together – from the very beginning.
and to think that dogdog is right there, with us, makes me realize that – actually – he must love when we dance.
it’s like a romper room book – from the back but not turned over. upside down.
or like i had stood on my head to click. which, of course, i didn’t.
a tree – full of leaves reaching, reaching. no shedding here. no drooping. no waning into the pull of autumn. instead, golden leaves – almost brilliant orange – standing on their stems, stretching, dancing.
perspective rearrange. it took me by surprise skimming through the photographs i had taken. a close-up of the leaves – just one other photo – was also flipped.
perhaps there were just a few minutes there – out in the forest – when the world turned upside down.
maybe we just don’t know. maybe that happens all the time…little smidges of time when all is flipped. maybe that’s good. especially when right side up is pokin’ at us a little. reminders to stand tall. reminders to stretch. reminders to dance.
i cannot get diana ross’ fabulous voice out of my head, “upside down, boy, you turn me inside out and ’round and ’round…”
we watched ‘the wedding planner‘ the night before we left for milwaukee to officiate a wedding. sweet and predictable, it was exactly what we needed friday night as we headed into a weekend that would spell bliss for a young couple.
this morning i read that pete and chasten are parents. there is a photo of them with two babies, newborns, a girl and a boy. the article made me cry for them. they are in their bliss.
in just this last week our dear friends welcomed a second grandchild and a daughter-in-law. their family grows, love begets love – love is just that – love – and they are blissful.
we danced last night at the outdoor patio reception and i was reminded of my weddings. both times filled with love and anticipation and the simple-profound complexity of the moment and the moments to come. no guarantees, no instruction books, no wisdom-of-the-universe or sage advice granted with the words “i do”. just love. both times bliss.
love is just love. we muddle through the highs and lows, the mistakes and grace, the celebrations and regrets. and love is still just love. pure and ridiculously complicated, our hearts swell as we love, love more and love again: partners and babies and added family members and dear friends. for seasons, for forevers, we punt our way through life and love, trying as we wake, trying harder the next day. moments rich with hearts flawed by humanness, hearts stirred by emotions too intense and too gossamer to grasp.
i think it all really boils down to this. all of it. no boundaries, no definitions, no exclusions. fragile and yet ever-powerful, ethereal and sustaining, love is really just love. it’s that easy. it’s that intricate. it’s tangly and it’s linear.
massimo actually spoke a few more words in the movie. adoringly and with respect he said, “love can’t always be perfect. love is just love.”
when my daughter was a baby, the thing that could calm her, quiet her unhappy crying, was to hold her tightly and dance with her. her favorite back then was the sound of marvin gaye’s heard it through the grapevine and i can remember it on repeat in the sitting room while we danced and danced and danced.
it seems perverse to think about dancing in the middle of a raging pandemic, in the middle of intense concern about david’s dad’s declining health, in the middle of being fired from my job. so much to worry about, the list seems expansive and ever-growing. i wonder what will calm us, what will quell the fears that keep us awake at night.
jonathan wrote to me, in the wise way of jonathan, and said to “get the water boiling and the corkscrew; it’s time to celebrate!!” he left no room to push back. “take stock,” he texted.
i’m wondering if i should put on the big chill soundtrack and put #1 on repeat. maybe the music of marvin gaye and dancing would help.
my front row seat on the dance floor of david’s studio affords me this unique opportunity to watch him waltz with his canvas, shift his weight from one leg to the other, lead the painting or let it lead him (much as i unintentionally do when we dance.) the images come to life. i can feel the pull in her neck, backward-bent in the beautiful flow of the tango, their faces raised to the sun in this morsel of TANGO WITH ME. i can feel their hands embracing, arms outstretched, reaching for their forward steps. the painting around them is magical and surreal, fantasy almost, just as a couple dancing is lost in the dreamy quality of their moving together.
ahhh. it is a privileged front seat i have. each time…watching another birth.
i have a unique front row seat to paintings in process. running downstairs to throw in another load of laundry or seek out a tool i need, i will glance at the easel in the studio to peek at what’s up next…this time, the sketch of two people dancing made me stop. it immediately made me thinking of when we have danced in the front yard or the kitchen or out on the deck or on a mountain trail. i got lost in the tango and wandered back upstairs, no new laundry spinning in the washer or tool in my hand.
the next time i looked at the easel i found these two people emerging and color exploding off the canvas. i have learned, in this time of living with a brush-in-hand-artist, that this is the under-painting, a place that involves steps at which i often want to tell him to stop!wait!it’s perfect! sometimes he does – stop. other times he keeps going, for the vision in his mind’s eye is beyond what is on the easel and there is more to develop.
it’s a unique place in the front row. maybe more comparable to back-stage or the green room or the recording studio before “record”…a place of preparation, a place of reflection, a place of swirling beauty, a place of possibility, a place where the-painting-someone-dreams-of-hanging-on-their-wall is being born.
jen and brad have been taking dance lessons for months. their daughter is getting married in a couple of weeks and they want to celebrate-dance under the warm savannah night sky at her reception. they have been dedicated to this; their lessons are top priority in their social calendar. from what we can see, their commitment has morphed from we-need-to-be-able-to-dance-well-together to we-love-this-together. what a gift to see them in their kitchen demonstrating the cool steps they have learned. they are getting polished and are more and more comfortable with various dances (especially “the push-pull,” jen explains.) mostly, they look like they are really having fun. truth be told, we don’t know of anything they have committed to that they haven’t thrown their whole hearts into; they are a picture of enthusiasm. they are a joy in our life.
on the other hand, we will look like bumbling-dancers under this same georgia sky. but that’s not the point. it is rare that you will be the center of attention when you are dancing – only a few times you are a bride and groom or the parents of or in a do-they-give-booby-prizes? dance competition. but we love to dance together. before our wedding, under linda’s (an absolute lover of all dance) tutelage, we learned an irish waltz that will remain one of the stunning moments of our reception in the old southport beachhouse. what happy dance took place that afternoon and night.
i remember many a day or night blissfully dancing with one of my babies in my arms. i even remember dancing around the living room solo or holding babycat. sometimes that was out of delight; sometimes it was in the search for joie de vivre, a yearning for cheer.
we have danced in the front yard, on the deck, in the kitchen in the middle of the night, in church and in airports. it matters not where you dance. as long as you dance. there is wisdom in dancing.
reverse threading 