Submitted by Ann Forlawn, “dancer in life” from Los Angeles, USA
My dance experience began when I was two years old in the arms of my father. Somehow I remember the feeling of being held and swung around gently by this big, wonderful man when I was tiny little tot. My father was heavy into ballroom dancing and swing. I don’t know how popular this is with a lot of people, but the classes or sessions that I go to seem to always have enough people. The people come and the people go, but there are always people coming. Whether it’s couples who want to learn how to look graceful on the dance floor for their first “very public wedding dance” or women who just want to learn how to move, there are always people coming.
I started taking swing dance lessons when I was in my teens after having done ballet. Ballet was okay, but it wasn’t as freeing to me as swing. In swing dancing there is a closeness with the person that you are dancing with that gives me a feeling of …. just niceness. It’s – I want to say that it’s sensual, but without the sex and without the feeling of sex – so I don’t want people to get the wrong idea. But, it’s nice because the two of you move as one person. I can’t describe it. It’s like the leaves dancing in the wind, one can’t do what it does without the other.
When I’m not dancing I miss it greatly. I took time off for children – like most women do – we put ourselves on the back burner for our kids – and now I’m back. I’ve missed the freeing feeling that it gives me. All the stress just melts away and disappears into nothing while I’m dancing. I am free. I am simply motion and nothing else.
I hope other women will share what kind of dance they like to do and how it makes them feel.
Thanks for letting me share WMTS!!