swing time

joe brought swing time home from the library.

i wonder if there's a support group out there for people who cry whenever they see fred astaire and ginger rogers dance. i could be president.

i don't cry because i'm a gushy sentimentalist (although that is why i cry at hallmark commercials). i cry because i wish i could dance. they are green green tears of jealousy.

i was the girl in ballet class who stood at the bar for an entire afternoon trying to teach my feet to skip. the other girls skipped around the wood parquet floor, twirling in their leotards and pink tights. they made it look so effortless. one foot and then the other.

i was the girl who was cast in the tap recital as "girl who dies." i tapped my way onto stage, only to leave seconds later under the cloak of the bad man who killed me.

i was the girl who would get onto the dance floor at EFY for "i would walk five hundred miles" because i could jump up and down, up and down -- but stood with my hands at my sides, plucking my skirt for the rest of the songs.

and when i saw saturday's warrior everything finally became clear to me. i was like pam! i was a dancer sometime before this life and by bum luck ended up in this body: the narrow shoulders, the wide flat feet, the meaty thighs, the tight tight hamstrings, the joints and bones that ache to find a beat.

but it's okay. someday i will be in a leotard and pink tutu, dancing across the wisps made by smoke machines. in heaven.

at last

henry slept the night.

and i got the feeling back in my fingers and toes and the edges of my brain.