Paige Travis: Dance Like No One is Watching (or The Rhythm is Gonna Get You)
I realized something at Bonnaroo. The revelation had been arriving for a while, but it really hit me in the 90-degree heat of midsummer while sharing personal space with 80,000-plus people in a 700-acre cow pasture. My epiphany? I dance. I can’t not dance. Stand me in front of live music, and I move instinctively, uncontrollably, even sometimes to music I don’t even like. (Dancing while seated is more difficult but not impossible.)
The dance process starts in my brain: “Mmmm, I hear that funky beat.” Then my cerebral sensors can’t handle all the input, so they have to throw the ball to the core muscles located in the perimeter of my hips and spine. “Ah, now I really feel the rhythm. Aw, yeah.” (Right now, for instance, I might have to turn off Mike Doughty from my iTunes in order to keep writing. Dancing and typing are incompatible; see above.)
I know people who enjoy live music without dancing. One of my best friends, bless his heart, can appear to be sleeping—eyes open, face slack—in front of even his favorite bands. It used to bother me that he didn't nod his head or tap a foot, but I got used to his cadaver-like stillness. I know he’s got soul; it’s just buried way deep down somewhere.
My boogie mojo, however, is located in my ears with a direct party line to my feet. And my arms and my hips. Perhaps my groove revelation occurred at Bonnaroo because I was surrounded by hippies, a people particularly known for their uninhibited flailing. Whether through subliminal suggestion or sheer osmosis, I adopted some of their moves, a certain posture of the back and outstretch of the arms that’s somewhere between a gypsy summoning the spirits and a hip-hop MC raising the roof. The position felt right, so I kept going (a good rule in general, I think). I can’t say I’d ever danced like that before, but dancing is like inventing something with every new beat.
I also can’t say I consider myself a good dancer. I’ve received no professional training. I dread to imagine what someone with actual booty control would say about my amateur gyrations. My only defense for such flagrant motion is that I can’t help it. It’s what my body tells me to do. And I'm happy to listen.
Paige Travis, publicist for A.C. Entertainment, seeks out thrilling
experiences as long as they don't involve actual danger.
Comments
This is a super sentence:
"My boogie mojo, however, is located in my ears with a direct party line to my feet."
Posted by: Smootz | July 11, 2006 12:12 PM