Slightly blinded by the angle of sunlight streaming in through the window, my pace slowed, my right foot molded to a finishing point. My choreography professor, sitting cross-legged against the mirrors splayed across one entire wall of her loft apartment, was silent for a moment.
"I just saw the architecture of your mind," she said.
This comment came as a relief to me at the time. I took it as a compliment, some stamp of approval on my latest choreographic adventure. It wasn't until later that I really thought about what she was saying. Someone who knew my dancing ability, choreographic experimentation and writing very well, this comment on my mind shining through in a physical way was so interesting to me. My particular writing style and analytical, perfectionist approach and was something I knew about myself ever since my minor 3rd grade freak out about a science fair project.
To "see the architecture," implying something designed carefully and specifically, of my mind through my dance and my making of dance was fascinating. It was the first time I ever felt that I had something unique and all my own to bring to the world of dance that I so wanted to be a part of and was too often trying to "fit in" rather than stand out.
Furthermore, to have someone react to your dancing with a reflection on your mind rather than have physical, technical or performance-visual response is not the most common. This, for me, was not a negative thing. In fact, it reassured this feeling I had inside and couldn't previously define...this feeling that the dance world was something I would always be an integral part of though not in the conventional way. I could create my own niche in this dance world.
In this moment I felt comfortable to stop pursuing the title of "Dancer" or "Choreographer" or even "Writer." And to this day I do all three, and have found a new title, that far too few posses, as a Dance Writer.
Why? Because it's where I wish to put my energy, effort and passion. When I write about dance, nonsense fades away, my focus naturally readjusts; it's refreshing. When I write about dance, it's my way of promoting an art form that needs and deserves it. And the beauty is there are so many ways to experience dance - whether it's on stage, in class, behind the scenes, in an audience, or on pen and paper. Now I can take this architecture of mind, and use it to bridge the major gap that exists between the dance performance and the greater public, one piece of writing at a time.
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