Dancing.
2007-03-19
Before I start, I would like to state that this will be the start of a series of my thoughts on dancing, not only on my feelings, but also my thoughts/viewpoints from watching life/people.First off, I love to dance. Dancing is part of what makes my whole persona. And it took me years to figure this out. Which is a bit unfortunate because I wished I had started sooner, but at least I started now than never. What makes it unique is how I started. This will of course bring on the usual “geek” “nerd” “loser” chants that people LOVE to label others as, but hell, we’re all labeled at one point in our lives or another. So I got inspiration from video games. The dancing ones. You might have heard of them. Dance Dance Revolution is one of the more current/popular ones. I was involved in that for a good amount of years as the moniker Dollar Bill.
It’s odd. To say I was inspired by a video game. But that’s the truth. See, in most clubs all I was seeing were people grinding into one another. And all I felt was… ok, this chick is horny, blah blah blah. I didn’t feel like there was any dance to it, it was just grind yourself onto the other person, yay. During the early days, people would actually get up and try to make dance routines on the machine. Looks lame to many, but to me I thought it was damn awesome. Damn awesome because it made the game FUN! It wasn’t then about who got the highest score, but about who can be the most creative. Who can be the most technical, who can work the crowd the most. It was just… surreal. Back then, I didn’t know about the scene, so I had no idea on how to find anyone.
It was during my research that I came upon pop n lock. And I delved further in to find a style that I actually was digging. I learned what the true difference was (you cannot lump them in as that because pop n lock is actually incorrect when describing the style), I learned that people of all ages were into it, and I learned that while there was a foundation, the style evolved to a point where anyone can be creative and free. I had to sought out teaching, so I got some videos, and just followed along. After awhile, I got the basics down, not paying as much to the foundation because I had no one to teach me this.
I found out about Broadway Dance Center, and took some classes there. Mostly from jazz/hip-hop, to pop/lock. I met Jazzy J there of the Electric Boogaloos *who gave me the name Mr. Freespirit, which to this day still fits me*, who taught a lot.
From there, I just got more confident, and less shy about myself being up there. I know I’m not in the best of shapes, but I saw a LOT of good people who are in worse shape that can out move anything I do.
From there, I just have been watching and trying to understand the other styles out there. From ballroom, to funk, to pop, to jazz, to broadway, to anything, I just keep watching and observing. What I’ve always noticed in social situations is that people can dance more than they think they can’t, but they need to overcome their insecurities. It’s odd how people would sing badly and feel confident, yet “feel like a dork” when trying to dance. Then again, real dancing isn’t about trying; it’s about doing. Locking was invented in this manner, for example.
I do miss it though a lot. Right now, the only thing holding me back from going is partially the weather, and partially the time. Being exhausted with work and life, I’ve just been needing something to help spur it back up. The inspiration. DDR isn’t part of it anymore, though I still like doing that from time to time: it is a good way to workout on an aerobics scale.
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