Dancing into the Now
By Julia Scott
When I was about four years old, I remember telling my mother I wanted to be a dancer. I distinctly recall my sister saying that I was too short. Somehow, I got tap lessons, and my sister, who was tall and thin, got ballet.
With my early dream squashed, I went on to other things as I grew older, including getting a degree in Natural Resources to be a park ranger. After a number of years, I realized I had succumbed to the dance anyway. Professional dancers never last as long as I have. I have been dancing for 27 years.
My earliest dance experiences were the Jerry Garcia Band when I was 14, reggae bands, and some of the best punk rock bands of the day. including the Dead Kennedys, Black Flag and Butthole Surfers, where we would “slam-dance.” In high school, my friends and I, the artsy freaks and skateboarders, could hardly wait for the school dance. Not so we could giggle with our girlfriends and flirt with the boys, or even attempt to drink alcohol, but just to dance. All we cared about was waiting for that one INXS or The Cure song when we’d jump up on the dance floor in our cool black clothing and our spiky hair and dance around all crazy while the “normal” kids looked on and wondered or laughed.
In college, as I pursued my park ranger career, I went to see my favorite band “Small Fish” every Thursday & Friday night, dancing the entire time to every single song. I remember walking home afterwards, sweaty and happy. My friends and I went to every weekend Grateful Dead show that we could from Eugene, Oregon to San Francisco. This was the best dancing environment I have ever experienced in my life. There were groups of people twirling and spinning, holding hands in a circle, exuberantly hugging one another after each song, and everyone guessing what the next song would be, so committed to the music and the dance. No one was afraid to dance wholeheartedly.
After college, I was seeing a Grateful Dead cover band in St. Louis called Jake’s Leg, and many other great bands every Friday night. When I discovered the band Widespread Panic, I eventually moved to the South, going to over 250 shows, continuing my dancing to its absolute peak!
I moved to Folly Beach ten years ago, where there is always some music playing in one establishment or another. I enjoy dancing as much today as I ever have, and can’t think of anything that relaxes and excites me more.
There’s nothing like being in a hole in the wall beach town bar with the lights low and the band getting ready to play. You know friends will arrive on the dance floor with greetings and hugs, and new strangers will come every week from distant states around the country and around the world to join in the fun. You just never know what will happen next.
And that’s the beauty of music in general, which by its nature is improvisational and unpredictable. Therefore, you must learn to go with the flow on the dance floor, which is one reason I love dancing so much. Music and dancing bring me right to the Now, the eternal moment, where I too am the instrument, and the song, and the dance of life, all at once, all as one.
Over the years, many people have graciously told me, “You are a beautiful dancer.” So I guess there’s a lesson here, which is to listen to your heart, even at a young age, because it knows your true desires, though you may not yet. Your deepest needs will find a way to the surface and eventually be expressed, perhaps in a circle of spinning color and sound.
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