Using Dance

When I told an acquaintance I was taking classical dance lessons — ballet, jazz, tap — she gave me a blank-eyed stare and said, ��How do you use it?�� From her point of view, the question apparently seemed logical. She had once taken ballroom dancing, and she could use her skill if/when she went to a ballroom or nightclub or wherever such dancing takes place. I have no corresponding ��use�� for classical dancing, though I have been invited to participate in a few performances so I have used some of the dances I know.

Still, in the year and a third that I��ve been going to class, I never once considered whether there was a use for dancing. If anything, it��s more that dance has a use for me. It takes me beyond myself and at the same time, takes me into myself, making me more comfortable with who I am than I��ve ever been in my entire life. (I think it has something to do with living in front of a mirror for all those hours each week.) It��s the only thing I��ve ever done that demands all of me — mind, body, spirit, strength, dedication, loyalty. (I listed ��mind�� first without even thinking about it, and I was going to change the order to put body first, but this is the right order. Without the mind — learning, memory, imagining — there is no dance.)

Dance is a generous taskmaster and gives back more than it demands. Although I am nowhere near as graceful, balanced, and strong as I would like to be, I have come a long way since I began taking lessons. I can feel muscles now where there used to be . . . whatever there used to be. And I am a bit more balanced and��graceful than I was before. Best of all, these benefits will remain with me even when I can no longer take dance classes.

There��s no need to ��use�� dance. Dance is its own reason for being.

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ��an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.�� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.