memory of a dancer

I am a victim of my own good memory.
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Mohan Gumatay (DJ Mo Twister) via www.twitter.com

It was a moist Saturday evening that was the milieu of a gathering I was surprisingly invited to. Being of a socially awkward nature, anxiety crept across the whole day imagining scenarios of unspeakable nature. How I am not fit to be in this situation, how my defeatist inclinations would leave me vulnerable, and ultimately downtrodden. But I knew for sure that missing it would be failing. For one only fails when attempts are ceased irrevocably.

So I went. And there, amidst the altitudes of Ortigas, was a sight to behold. Bloggers and friends, lovers and acquaintances, people whom I’ve previously known, and some I have yet to encounter, melded and mixed, mingled and moved in a hodgepodge of inebriated abandon, of animated discourse, of sensual fragilities, and social serenades. Most of them I didn’t have the courage to introduce myself to, some of them I was uneasy because of a certain histories, others felt like strangers from a different lifetime, vaguely familiar yet blatantly distant. But I was reminded that the choice to be happy is a daily struggle, a decision that must be spelled for oneself, despite the encumbrances of circumstance.

To speak, I would imagine, must be a challenge for me. And a challenge to those I would converse with, for too often I find my words too distant and precise for social rapport to grow. So I listened, and observed. To touch would be tantamount to suicide. For the mere brushing of skin leaves me breathless, and that connection rarely comes along in requited form. So I danced.

And dance I did.

For when I dance, the world feels right. The music becoming my pacemaker. When I dance, I go beyond what my physiological morphology lacks. I transcend my definition. I feel taller, in shape, and great looking. All the attributes I do not possess, I achieve. When I am one with the dance floor, the rhythm takes my insecurity. It is cathartic and divine, pure and empowering. With strangers as audience, and newfound friends as my steady ledge to cling to, I danced. As if I was 23 again.

Memory is a curious thing. It stretches its double-edged blade across one’s heart like the strings suspending from a grand puppeteer’s scaffold. Any attempt to make sense of its capacity to cull emotions long considered abysmal and lost to oblivion would be surprised how it can just as easily remind us of the exquisite as if it just occurred moments ago. Strong memories latch on with the sensual, from the scent of musk, to the thudding of a house beat, these sensory cues become longstanding catalysts that allow memories to resurface, awaiting that crevice in one’s composure as an opportunity to flood, and from footnotes of a long-lived reality to become the melody of the present once again.

Once, a long arcane time ago, in a different life and in the shell of a different person, I was a social butterfly. Hidden beneath layers of insecurity and unrest, seething anxiety and rebellious dispositions, I redefined myself as the epitome of a party animal. That singular individual that thrives in the superficiality of attention, and that unquenchable thirst for validation by assigning the conception of self-worth against the yardstick of other people’s perceptions. I was young then, possessing of a good physique, and an audacity that fails my better judgment. The dance floor was my kingdom, and my body my tool, to elicit the reaction I wanted, and feed an insecurity with hollow sustenance.

I was naïve. To think that human touch is the proof of emotion, and I pried upon touch to define what emotions I can feign or gain, in the end obfuscating my own conception of worth. And dignity. Frail against the labyrinthine travails of a travesty of my own weaving.

Years passed, heartache and rejection have enveloped that lingering insecurity into physical manifestations of my failed attempts at love. Growing adamantine and stern beyond the socially acceptable, I dwelt on the cambered belief that to be detached is to be strong. How gravely erroneous I was.

That night when the music took me into her womb, the melody became my mettle, and I was once again new. Like that young design student in awe of the possibilities of life. But there’s a difference, for then when I danced, the objective was to find another. To seduce, and elicit, to attract and appeal. This time, it was to find myself. To rediscover who I am, by the language of my motions, and the sentences of the beats, I was speaking again. Not by words, and phrases, but by grinds and segues. And I never felt more eloquent, and honest.

Soon people started calming down. The music mellowed to a softer lullaby of ballads. Couples found their corners to settle into the night, friends found themselves reminiscing and conversant, others found their way home from this place. And there I was. Alone again, strewn across the dado rail that presented the expanse of Pasig, I waited for dawn to arrive, and bask in its brilliant glow.

Memory is a curious thing. How it can remind us, and forgive us, how it can spite us and comfort us. And how, by the action of memory, we learn. That life changes as we do. And that our humanity resides in the memories we keep.

It was past 7am when I alighted the elevator. After saying a quick farewell to one of the celebrants, I found myself walking along the streets of Ortigas restless, yet euphoric, exhausted yet alive. Just like how I was back then. A dancer. It is a reminder that one evening of dance can leave me breathless and thankful. For that memory, and for this new one.

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To Odin, for allowing me to discover that common ground can exist in the most surprising places. To Poi, for inviting me, and reminding me that to be human is to be connected, and that sincerity goes a long way, that we are not books, but manuscripts, pages are drafts to an unending tale, and that connection can come not from its covers, but by its footnotes.. To Moi, for being proof that it is possible, and that patience and honesty makes it all worth while. To Ewik, for showing how intellect and wit can coexist beautifully, and in such an amiable engaging form.

And to my dance floor co-habitants, for allowing me that small real estate of floor to share with you, even for just that evening. I am deeply indebted.



Image from here.