Scarlett Letters

My tap teacher was complaining about being old today. He's 35. I'm in the oldest person in the room by at least 20 years. I suspect he knows I'm older than him; I'm not sure he realizes by how much. I'll tell him at some point.

Last class, we did paddle rolls, a step I remember from childhood. I can still do them, and do them fairly quickly. I did them in front of the teacher and he asked me why I wasn't in Level 2 yet. "Next session," I told him. "I wanted to make sure I had everything down." Practice, practice, practice.

Which reminds me, when I have money again, I need to order myself a practice floor.

I came home today and massaged both my feet. I've had some pain in both my feet and my ankles. I'm going to keep dancing. I will not let this stop me. I will just have to baby my feet and ankles more. Also lose some weight.

I'm loving these classes. It gives me joy to be doing this. I feel competent and I'm having fun. And it's something only three other people in my life are doing right now, one of whom is far away. It feel like it's mine. I know that sounds strange. No one has a monopoly on their art. But I love that it's different than anything nearly anyone else I know is doing. You can see a little video of me with a small sample of what I've been learning, if you like. It all makes me wish I'd done this a lot sooner.

When I was a kid, raised on movie musicals, I wanted to take tap dancing lessons. I saw Gene Kelly, Ann Miller, Fred Astaire, Judy Garland, and I wanted to dance. My mother insisted that all dance grows out of ballet and I had to study ballet first. So for a couple of years I studied ballet. Finally, I got to study tap and I adored it. Of course, by then, some of my passion had waned, mostly because I had to do what my mom wanted me to do first; it was harder for me to want to practice, and my mom badgered me about it. (It was thus with music as well. I wanted to study violin. She didn't want to "have to listen to that scratching all the time" so I played flute instead, and wasn't as passionate about it.) Eventually lessons stopped because there was no money for them, and that was that.

In my thirties, I tried going back to ballet and I enjoyed it. Problem by then, of course, was that my body hadn't grown into ballet form, and so by the fifth or sixth lesson, I was having pain in my legs that meant I was actually damaging my hips. I went to the doctor about it, and was told that I had to stop or I'd do permanent damage. When I quit the class, the teacher was disappointed. She said, "But you're good. You're the only person in the class that actually knows what she's doing." C'est la vie.

Earlier this spring, I started taking tap lessons. I love it. I'm good and I know it. My teacher says so. I'm practicing (perhaps not as much as I should be, but I am). The things I learned as a kid are coming back almost instinctively. I went yesterday afternoon to try to find better fitting shoes than the ones that I have (mine are too long and the ball of my foot isn't hitting the toe tap the way it should). It felt good to go looking for tools for my art that were actually appropriate. Thank goodness that beginner tap shoes aren't as expensive as street shoes! Anyway, because my feet are short and wide, the shop is putting in a special order to try to get some pairs that are suited to my strange-for-dancers feet.

I have a tiny little dream. My tiny little dream is to get good enough to perform locally. I don't know if that will ever be possible, but I want to try. I love being in front of an audience. I know I have presence. I love the bling and shine of being on stage. And I think I can entertain; I've done it before. And so we go.