What I learned from dancing poorly
Over a decade ago, I saw a Led Zepplin-themed burlesque show called House of Thee Unholy. It included a performance piece accompanied by the song Kashmir, performed by Seattle choreographer Lily Verlaine.
The performance was mind-bogglingly impressive: an athletic ballet/burlesque hybrid involving Lily balancing on one leg like a goddess for five minutes.
I was like, HOLY WUT the first time I saw it, and then I went to the show again and was like, NO SERIOUSLY WUT IS EVEN HAPPENING.
I was so blown away that I decided to email Lily. We have mutual friends and had crossed paths socially once or twice, but had never spent time together.
In my email, I re-introduced myself, and told her how her performance had deeply inspired me. Then asked her if she would take me on as a student… not to learn that specific routine, but to get some of the vibe of it.
I explained that while I’m a lifelong dancer, I’ve got zero classical training. I’m not especially good at complex choreography, nor do I have much experience with being instructed. I might have an at-home dance studio, but it’s for goofing around and having fun in — I do not have the physical or verbal vocabulary of a trained dancer.
I told Lily that my motivations were
a) learning and growing and
b) spending my…
