There's that old saying that something "... is like writing about dance" -- when one thing is painfully inadequate for capturing or describing something experiential/masterful/moving. A bit like me writing about romance. But I'm going to have to attempt it because last night I went with friends to see the Trisha Brown dance company at Sadlers Wells.
Dance is one of the few arts I have no training in, insight to, or opinion about. It's a bit of a mystery. I have no sense of what's new or old form or style, what's exceptional or exceptionally awkward, when they're meant to be dancing in unison or if slight variations were planned. It's hard to tease apart the concept of a dance piece. The three last night, for example, we jokingly called: Dancing buddhas in urban wastelands, The loneliness of an ear infection, and My rainbow lies in tattters. They were really about none of those, obviously, but without the floridly written programme it was hard to tell what narrative/feeling/moment they were dancing.
They were quite beautiful. Modern, sparse, lightly accompanied, movingly performed. But foreign all the same. I felt quite the philistine, especially when we were uncertain whether to get up and leave when the curtain came down during what was a short break between dances.
On then to Exmouth Market for tapas. My dinner company: Karin, a fellow ex-pat who can protest her preference for living here whilst simultaneously launching into longingly detailed discussions of New York and krispy kreme donuts. Tim and his flatmate Michael, both rail thin with shocking amounts of blond hair and a charming habit of over-e-nun-see-a-shun for effect. It was lovely company -- the flirtatious snarl of gay man is a language I'd fear I forgotten. Unfortuantely, my decreasingly poor eyesight (and the red wine) and the nervousness of new people left me with a pounding headache.
So today, the languid bodies of the dancers in my memory, and the harsh reality of my hungover body in the mirror terrorised me into going to the gym where the sight of my jiggling body on a treadmill probably terrorised the body-concious of Soho. Now let's see if my new birthday resolutions of getting out more, meeting new people, and getting healty outlast the week.
Dance is one of the few arts I have no training in, insight to, or opinion about. It's a bit of a mystery. I have no sense of what's new or old form or style, what's exceptional or exceptionally awkward, when they're meant to be dancing in unison or if slight variations were planned. It's hard to tease apart the concept of a dance piece. The three last night, for example, we jokingly called: Dancing buddhas in urban wastelands, The loneliness of an ear infection, and My rainbow lies in tattters. They were really about none of those, obviously, but without the floridly written programme it was hard to tell what narrative/feeling/moment they were dancing.
They were quite beautiful. Modern, sparse, lightly accompanied, movingly performed. But foreign all the same. I felt quite the philistine, especially when we were uncertain whether to get up and leave when the curtain came down during what was a short break between dances.
On then to Exmouth Market for tapas. My dinner company: Karin, a fellow ex-pat who can protest her preference for living here whilst simultaneously launching into longingly detailed discussions of New York and krispy kreme donuts. Tim and his flatmate Michael, both rail thin with shocking amounts of blond hair and a charming habit of over-e-nun-see-a-shun for effect. It was lovely company -- the flirtatious snarl of gay man is a language I'd fear I forgotten. Unfortuantely, my decreasingly poor eyesight (and the red wine) and the nervousness of new people left me with a pounding headache.
So today, the languid bodies of the dancers in my memory, and the harsh reality of my hungover body in the mirror terrorised me into going to the gym where the sight of my jiggling body on a treadmill probably terrorised the body-concious of Soho. Now let's see if my new birthday resolutions of getting out more, meeting new people, and getting healty outlast the week.
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