Dance On Our Graves

Originally posted July 26th 2023

I’ve been thinking about dancing. Every so often I take an evening to watch ballet videos on youtube. I tend to look up clips of Rudolph Nureyev, a male ballet dancer who rose to prominence in the 60s. When I was a teenager, a couple years in a row my parents brought us to see the Nutcracker in San Jose. At the end of the evening I would dream of being a ballet dancer, being able to move my body in such a fantastical way. Often times I feel like I am at the mercy of my body, and to dance would be asking too much. Perhaps I’m scared if I try something bad will happen (I sense a theme here, good=bad).

Unfortunately whenever I think about dancing I think about Paper Route’s Dancing On Our Graves instead of something that might actually pick me up and get my feet to move. Like conversations, I tend to daydream of myself dancing rather than actually dance. I don’t know how to let go. I worry that I will come across as silly. I worry I worry I worry. Which is the opposite of dancing.

I watched a video on instagram of the actor/dancer Levan Gelbakhiani, star of And Then We Danced (2019), dancing in his kitchen. I’m always jealous of how dancers move their shoulders, the command of their bodies yet are simultaneously being controlled by the music. But maybe dancing isn’t about control but surrender and that’s where I’m going wrong. I worry I’m off beat, too rigid. But how is one meant to start if not badly?

Most of the time, when I dance it is a joke. The only way I tend to express myself is doing a bit or talking too much. Dancing requires me to take myself seriously. Or at least, I have to not, for once, commit to the bit. Even when I have danced with others, it becomes some kind of performance, I can’t allow it to be intimate. I usually will jokingly twirl my dance partner, a way of keeping distance. Sometimes they’ll spin me back and I’ll think “No, I’m not supposed to be spun. I am not a woman who spins.” On rare occasion, I have allowed myself to dance without trying to pull away. These moments are so rare I can count them on one hand. But those are some of my happiest memories. A slow dance at the end of the night, tired, head resting on someone’s chest. Being held while some sad 90s indie song fades out. Being 17 alone in my room at my grandparents house, listening to Teen Suicide’s Sylvia Plath as the sun sets, dancing, moving my hands around and smiling and that forever being the moment I think of when I think of my happiest self. Dancing on the sticky floor of The Montague Arms on its closing night, Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough playing after King Krule played the venues final show. Moshing at The Old Blue Last while Wolf Alice performs. Dancing at Koko to Foals You Don’t Have My Number with someone who would soon become my best friend. For someone who often says they don’t like to dance, most of my fondest memories have dancing as a central part.

Even when I have fantasies of getting married, I don’t think about a ceremony, I think about the dancing. What would the playlist be? My shoes would have to allow for movement. When I picture my dream home, I think of space in the kitchen to glide around as the water boils. Many of my favourite artworks depict people dancing. When I imagine myself happy, I imagine myself dancing.

I want to spend the rest of this year dancing, to hold myself more loosely, more adaptable, more graceful (and sometimes to allow yourself grace you must get messy, space for grace is letting the water fall). I think being a bad dancer is better than being stood in the corner.

I’ve been thinking about love. Well, I’m always thinking about love. I’m embarrassed to say so. What’s that Richard Siken quote? “The enormity of my desire disgusts me”. It’s so embarrassing to talk about wanting love. It’s seen as a tragic dilemma, discussed only between close friends at the bar. You never want to seem desperate do you? No, you have to be so laid back and chill and “whatever, it’s fine”. It seems ridiculous to be so scared to reveal that really, I would like someone to hangout with. Someone to slow dance with. Someone I can lose in a gallery and find at the end. I’m not terribly interested in the honeymoon phase, I’m sure it’s quite nice though, but really, I’m not after intense bombastic love. It makes me think of those people who do flash mob wedding proposals. Not for me.

I’ve been a hopeless romantic for as long as I can remember, yet romantic love eludes me. I’m such a hopeless romantic I recently made a playlist around the concept of slow dancing without having a dance partner, hoping one day I might be able to use it. But for now, I sent it to some friends who might make use of it while I can’t. Dating has always felt like I was trying to jump start a dead car and got tired of it breaking down, so I just walk everywhere now. I think the last date I went on was in 2016? Which umm….that’s pretty rough not gonna lie.

After going back to therapy back in October, something that kept coming up was how I decided it wasn’t going to happen for me. Because, and I believe I’ve mentioned this previously, if I made the decision that it wasn’t going to happen that I had a choice in the matter. My therapist does not approve of this sentiment and even disapproved of me reading Amy Key’s Arrangements in Blue (I’ve decided to save it until I’m a bit older). It’s confirmation bias. If I decide it’s never going to happen it very likely wont and I’ll be proven right because of self-fulfilling prophecy. Verses taking a risk and yeah, it might never happen. But why write it off?

Is this substack gonna turn into a Sex and City-like blog? Me looking for love in New York City? Probably not. I already think I’ve said too much. But if you or if you know anyone who looks like Adam Lazzara from Taking Back Sunday, the blueprint for every man I’ve ever fancied, I’m willing to put aside my cynicism.

That being said, I should renew my drivers license. Am I getting carried away with that metaphor? Well here’s another one:

When I imagine what love feels like, I think it must be like sitting on the beach at dusk. Watching the waves, everything is moving yet still. I think of it as Northern Californian beaches with the winds and cliffs, Redwood trees in the distance. Everything is always dark blue, never sunny like in the movies.

When I was in my late teens/early 20s, there was a sentiment online that one should romanticise their life. It was something I attached to and have had trouble shaking off since. I think the wording is wrong. I think the point should be, rather than transform something through a romantic lens to see its beauty, is to see the beauty without the red tint. I think that’s what a lot of furniture designers get right. To find beauty in the practicality of an object rather than make it useless in the pursuit of aesthetics. That’s not to say a “useless” item must have a practical use. But I think approaching something with a matter-of-factness helps you not fall into never ending, relentless beauty. Because what even is beauty? Everyday I am haunted by tiktoks of wonderful noses getting turned into slim, bland, beautiful noses (I’ll fight every plastic surgeon I don’t care stop making everyone look the same!). Is beauty a singular thing? Is it not just a perception? Well yes, but it’s easier to accept what the popular consensus is. I fall for it. You fall for it. We all are subject to the standards set before us by culture. And it’s hard to disagree because there are somethings we like about this beauty. I’m online all the time and I am constantly looking at beautiful images and people and places and food. It’s all so nice looking. And I am bored by it. Beauty has become so so dull (maybe it always was).

Maybe I’ve confused beauty with pretty. Pretty is tame and safe and advertiser friendly. Perhaps I’m starved of beauty.

I’m thinking about beauty and remember a friend and I holding each others faces in a club singing along to The Killers and the texture of their skin under my hands was magnificent (no drugs were involved in this instance). Almost leather-like and how easily I could manipulate their features, they were not set in stone but a malleable being. I’m thinking about beauty and how so many people hate pictures of themselves because to be froze in time is not a person but a cardboard cutout. We are creatures in movement and we are dancers full of water. It is not romantic, it just is.

Thank you for reading,

Enya xx