Prologue 

To walk. By definition it means to go about the Earth, but I guess it depends on who you are. To a baseball player, it means a free base, although in basketball, it’s a violation. To a union member, it denotes a strike, while for the family dog it simply means to be lead around the neighborhood. Walking seems like the easiest of tasks, that is, if injury does not prevent such movement. But let me tell you, to walk is the most difficult thing in this life. Why? Because you see, in some circles, to walk refers to the way in which you live your life. It took me years to discover that I had forgotten how to walk. I got very good at running, mind you, running from one thing to the next and always running towards some goal.

 

I recall telling my nephew not to run with scissors, attempting to prevent injuries to himself or others. But I never stopped to look down at what was in my hands, for what I was holding onto was much more dangerous. People have been said to wear their heart on their sleeve, I carried mine in clenched fists. I did not trust my body enough to keep it safe and so in fear I gave it a new home outside of myself.

I’ve loved many people in my life, including my family, friends and even a few gentlemen, but somewhere along the way, I forgot how to truly love myself. And so, I ran. Some people run for health, some for pleasure, I, dear reader, ran for my life.

In a moment, I’ll take you to the starting block, the place where this leg of my journey began.

 

But first, I must admit, while this is my story, I think it might be your story too. We may be different for appearance sake, but in reality, we are all the same. We are all straddling a very fine line between two very different worlds. On my right, I see a world filled with so-called right choices, and on my left, a world filled with what can easily be described as wrong choices. It seems like it would be easy to choose.

But what if those two worlds appeared identical? Or better yet, what if the appearance of those worlds deceived us? I think the fact that you and I have a choice in the matter is the root of all that ails us. There are always consequences to the choices we make. By choosing one, we have effectively made the other our enemy, or at least empowered the other to plague our thoughts and actions. I think, perhaps, it is not until we refuse to choose that we find truth. What truth, you ask? That our world was chosen for us and that we, dear reader, need only be ourselves.

If only it were that easy. I played a stellar chameleon for years of my life, and could be almost what anyone needed or wanted me to be. With focus on everyone and everything else, choreographed footsteps matching moments as needed, it is no wonder I eventually lost my balance. Dance is where I found my footing. And my re-entry into dance is when I finally met me, or perhaps when I finally just let me be me. That’s when I took off the veil.

 

Despite my penchant for avoiding cameras, cherishing anonymity and having long-since accepted my photogenic failures, that period in my life prompted more honest, autobiographical, photographic evidence of a life well-lived. But the pictures hardly do it justice. Previously laden with landscapes or architecture, for I’d always coveted such a profession that perfectly married science and art, knowledge and creativity, physics and brushstrokes, these new insights, for my friends and followers, must have been a shocking admission across the not often used social media platforms. To view my face, or my physique, or my partners, or my fashion choices. Or maybe they didn’t give it a second thought. Maybe I was the only one who cared that I’d been hiding for a decade.

I’ve never liked labels, but I had accepted one: broken. Bent is more accurate, really. And maybe that too is a bit maudlin, for what follows is a more delightful recitation of memories. But as with all happy endings, or new beginnings, it often starts with something devastating.

Perhaps she didn’t understand her words, or perhaps she was unaware of the existence of a bedside manner, but let’s not spend too much time on the so-called bearer of my bad news destiny.

“Your life as you know it, or maybe as you wanted it to be, is gone. It’s time for a new plan.”

“What do you suggest?”

“That’s up to you. Not my job. Take care.”

I failed for years. Not by societal standards, but by my own.

As a girl, I feared nothing. But I took pleasure in the simplicity of daily routine, tasks to be completed and checking boxes off a list. I imagined how difficult life would be to live as thrill- seeker, never satisfied by a reading assignment or play outside until the street lights came on. How tortuous to endure discontent? I was no such girl. I invested in hard work, practice and found talents in nearly every attempt at a hobby. I was lucky. I was never bored. There wasn’t time to be bored.

But I never quite fit within a specific mold (outsider will likely sum up my epitaph). I did, however, find myself at home in dance. Ballet, jazz, tap, contemporary, hip hop, and everything in-between: they defined my music, strength, courage, friendships, travel and lifestyle. Toes pointed. Shoulders back. Long lines. Follow-through. Finish strong. And there was such a thing as perfection, or at least my coaches demanded such. Imagine from a young age spending eleven months of the year perfecting a routine, as an individual and in a group, where teammates depended upon your flawlessness and could fault you at any sign of failure or weakness, and in that twelfth month, you performed. Success meant trophies and titles. Success meant potential scholarships. And after practice ad nauseam, the same routines, to the same music, with the same people, and the same adversaries, month after month, it all came down to a two-minute and ten second performance that sealed your individual and collective fate. You were a success or a failure. You were a winner or a loser. You were a champion or nothing.

There were injuries along the way. The occasional broken bone, sprain, pulled muscle, maybe even a concussion (but the coach never let me stop long enough to find out). The injuries healed, easily, and most have not left scars.

 

I quit that life on my own terms, when I was done. Not dance, no, that I would never give up. I gave up competition. I gave up my team. I gave up practice. And I gave up when we were on top. The year before I quit (and although that is the right word, I dislike the negative connotation it breeds), I began craving a life of other-than-this. I had other interests. I wanted other people in my life. I wanted new experiences. I was no longer willing to check boxes down my list. Simplicity had long since left my modus operandi and although I would never reach the label of thrill-seeker, I had an insatiable craving for more.

By the blessings of my parents, who aided my linguistic endeavors, I was fortunate to travel abroad, proving that my seven years of language study would not go unused. It did not. For ten weeks, I travelled from city to countryside, on the Metro, on the night train, landing on the pebble beaches of the Riviera and then that noisy bus through the Alps. Everything was new and different and beautiful. And I was young. I spent my eighteenth birthday in Paris. Lucky girl. Wine was less expensive than water and we indulged. Food was not refrigerated but fresh each day and we relished. We took breaks. We savored moments. And we walked.

I walked more than I had ever walked before. But nothing about those walks meant getting from place to place. It’s where I learned to love walking. Through the long corridors of Versailles, down the streets of Lyon and Aix-en-Provence, throughout the endless rooms of the Louvre, and across bridges. I walked across so many bridges. And that morning on the aqueduct, just outside of the city, when the stairs made me dizzy and once on top, we were all inches away from destruction. But I walked across the aqueduct. No place in America would allow for such a liability.

I walked towards my parents at the airport upon my return and they, having not recognized me, knew something had changed. I was a different person abroad, even the Parisians assumed I was Quebecois (not American, thankfully), based upon my accent. I assumed college would provide the same opportunity, for me to flesh out the ‘real me’ or the parts of me that had been hidden by over-scheduled youth endeavors. It did, but not in the way I expected. Perhaps I’ll leave those discussions for another time and get back to the task at hand.

College turned into law school. Then came the unexpected injury. The injury like none before.
The injury that impacted not just dance – it halted everything.

I had never considered my body before. I never predicted its failure. I never planned for a life
without ability, without strength – and fear crept in.

Plagued by inability, physical and mental, to recover with any haste, I settled into intellectual pursuits and routine. My education was temporarily halted, a year off for recovery or at least the hope of recovery. All I did was read. I returned to studies before I’d met my cure. Blind faith. Will-power. Drive. Ambition. Education. Work. Career. Predictable cadence. Success even, by those so-called societal standards. But accommodations for brokenness replaced fearlessness, never quite believing in a time for wholeness.

And then in the comfort zone of a random courtroom, nearly ten years after my so-called recovery, a relative stranger and hero of the moment challenged my peaceful complacency.

​

Salsa On2.

One class and I was hooked. Over the next two months, I attended every class my schedule would permit. And on a random Spring evening, I bypassed the anxiety of re-injury, social awkwardness, and generalized fear of the unknown. I spent a blissful night dancing with strangers.

Then came an event that defined the rest of my summer, but really helped me re-define my life. Shocking my colleagues, who pleaded with me to take vacations, socialize or just stop working so hard, I took a day off to attend dance workshops. That day turned into a weekend. They called it a Congress, but my years of political science studies did not prepare me for this assembly. I made new friends, the kind you meet at summer camp as a kid and can never forget or replace, and spent inspirational moments with mere acquaintances who turned into go-to partners in dance and conversation.

They invited me to an impromptu, we-just-can’t-stop-dancing-so-let’s-find-a-random-space-and-play-some-music session. We found a spot next to a fountain, perfectly placed across from a courthouse. My personal irony. That’s when they introduced me to Zouk, and although I didn’t know its' name at the time, Kizomba. The walking dance. My walking dance.

Although the pains from an injury I will never really forget still exist, they fade into the music, friendships, experiences, patient and passionate instructors and the renewed lifestyle of a person who can still be, so many things.

It all began with a man. My hero of the moment. But if you’re hoping for an epic romance, plenty of writers before me have tortured that pen. Some have even succeeded. Rather, if, like me, you understand that ninety-nine percent of the people we meet are meant for something other than our predictable coupling, perhaps you’ll see this for what it is: my love letter to friendship and dance.

And if, like me, you peruse these words as if set to music, and melodies infiltrate each step you take, then I hope, dear reader, that somewhere along the way you realize that we’ve been dancing.

Time to meet the Lawyer.