Introduction:
What a truly great competition! My most all time favorite comp; this year was
no exception, delightfully punctuated by the appearance of special friends and
North Carolina family members greeting us for a Monday and Saturday night
treat. And I have pictures to prove
it!
The Venue:
Always attending to detail, the competition was meticulous
in its execution thanks to the sweat and tears of the organizer couple Hillary;
the venue pristine and cozily nestled in the womb of the Grove Park Inn, itself
a palace of magnificence and grandeur. The lobby is so large that the front
desk, concierge, and hotel services desks and lobby bar were all insignificant,
while the two fireplaces located on the smaller ends of the rectangular room
sparkled and crackled with life. Indeed,
the colossal lobby fireplaces were an inviting temptation, large enough to concomitantly
envelope and consume more folks then can fit into a large SUV should that be
the intended function, which hopefully it was not. Nevertheless, the fireplaces were
uncomfortably magnetic; the powerful flames drawing one closer and closer,
mesmerizing and alluring. Only the rush of pain from the intense heat would halt
the march of death, jolting one back to reality, escaping safely from the
hypnotic trance of the dancing flames.
Unbeknownst, the fireplace was the perfect and powerful metaphor for my
life in ballroom dancing, especially my week at the Heritage Classic, 2015.
The hotel lobby was made for a giant, ceilings so high they
take tall scaffoldings to reach, widely crafted warm wooden pillars and walls
constructed from large cubes of immovable grey stone insuring a sense of
permanence, a far contrast from the plastic and toothpick construction of our
modern day world. The rest of the Grove
Park Inn followed suit with one beautiful magnificence after another including
the competition ballroom. Located in the outskirts of Asheville, it is protected
by trees, quiet and privacy, a perfectly site for the hustle and bustle and raw
nerves of a major dance completion.
Why Am I Alone?
Why it is so difficult for more students from Divino Ritmo
Dance Studio to attend this event bewilders my imagination. To be sure, other students….as many as five
or six…. have come in the past as this is at least my 5th straight
Heritage Classic competition…see other postings! The venue, the level of
competition, the perfectly executed schedule of events, the friendly and regal North
Carolinians, the engaging organizers, the varied ballroom venders selling dance
jewelry and clothes, the food at the Grove Park Inn, the beautifully adorned and
colorful dining room with dance floor, the jazzy ensemble of musicians playing upbeat
dance music during dinner, the classy and charming town of Asheville, its
restaurants, the Biltmore Estates, etc, etc, all make for a powerful
allure. Travelling from Hawaii on Delta
directly to Atlanta and the short puddle jumper to Asheville is an easy itinerary
to travel. Perhaps it’s the time zone
disparity and jet lag from Hawaii to the east coast, perhaps it is the urban
legend of the ghost inhabiting the interior stonewalls of the Grove Park Inn,
perhaps it is no rational reason but rather the fear of the unknown?
But I wouldn’t miss this competition for the world, and as I
boarded the plane from Asheville to Atlanta on our way returning home, I could
not rid myself of the residual taste of the most delicious cauliflower
casserole consumed the night before that prompted second helpings for both
Yanna (my dance teacher) and myself. It
is worth returning back next year to Ashville just for this reason!
Da Pain in Da Feet; OR The Pain of Defeat:
Nothing materialized as planned. I was expecting to do well in Bronze and to
struggle with Silver heats in Standard, but do better in Silver Smooth. In
fact, the only dance style I did well in …..in the single dance events….. was
in Rhythm. I encountered known competitors
in Silver Smooth that I have never beaten except for the Holiday Classic 2013
(see posting), who greeted me at the door.
With many more competitions under their belt, they had remarkably
improved even from the baseline of our most recent encounter. I had no chance against them as I observed
their refined skills and lost every heat prompting me to comment graciously and
sincerely in feedback. There is no shame
in losing to a “more worthy” competitor.
Still it felt like it was a 1, 2 punch as they took turns in reducing me
to dance rubble on the competition floor like a tag-team wrestling match
beating down an opponent already mangled, bruised, contracted and barely alive.
In silver standard, I was venturing on unchartered territory
as I unwittingly convinced Yanna that my time had come to venture into
silver. But as fate would have it, my
skills were contested against a more experienced Gold level dancer who I have
admired for years as a dancer with advanced skills and gracious presence. Just to feel that I could be on the same dance
floor with him made me feel good; I had NO expectation that I would take a
single heat, and I didn’t.
In Bronze Latin, I won some and lost some but I was more or
less beaten by one worthy opponent who I have taken in the past. Well, no one comes back thinking they can
repeat the scoring of the past as every student is striving to improve from
competition to competition. Still I was a bit surprised, as much as he was glowing
and beaming in delight….at least until the final confrontation….see below.
Yes, nothing occurred as “planned” as conceived by my feeble
mind. It was pretty much a difficult
week with some exceptions. Having gone
through some awful months of painful injuries of my feet….with every possible diagnostic
entity identified in my medical records, pain in every conceivable location,
redness and swelling, jutting bunions aggravated by braces placed to support
every foot joint, I was expecting some pain and foot limitation that just
didn’t materialize thanks to good luck, prior strengthening exercises and
Celebrex.
Instead of the pain in
my feet, it was the pain of defeat
that commanded the week of horror at the Heritage Classic 2015. But I am upbeat because there were
unexpected moments of success to be jubilant about that I will recount below
starting with the story of Dr. Outrageous.
Dr. Outrageous:
Well, I am a mature 68- year old who dances for fun and to
improve his dance skills. Yeah,
right. In Bronze Latin, I followed the
path of splitting dance heats with the worthy opponent mentioned above, until
the fateful 3 Dance Scholarship that I was competing in, pitted against this
gentleman and two or three other ladies.
I was in a good mood thinking I had nothing to lose and expecting to
come in last based on the supposition that ladies are difficult to beat and my
previous failure to command the gentlemen single dance events. I danced my cha cha and rumba and was
generally pleased. But I messed up on my
samba in the final moments when I could not accommodate to a certain change in
direction that clearly I should have been able to do. Storming off the dance floor, glowing with
anger, cursing, flailing and assailing myself for my miserable mistake, all I
wanted to do was get the fu…. out of there and return to my room, and burry my
head under my pillow and disappear from life.
Yanna, in her wisdom, said NOTHING, realizing the futility
of any words when such anger was being displayed, but TOLD me I could NOT leave
the ballroom until the awards were presented.
My stomach burned with acid, every moment felt like an eternity waiting
for conformation of my miserable performance. When it came, as the names were
announced from last to first, as certain as I was that I would be last, the
names were ticked off until mine was announced.
I somehow took FIRST place in this 3 Dance event! My stomach went from
acidy to more acidy, and I somehow had to reverse my self-loathing physiology
to accept the miracle of the year, which was not easy to do without some forthcoming
afternoon coctail.
Nothing was Standard!
There were other moments of joy. Besides the Latin 3 Dance Scholarship trophy,
I won a best silver solo trophy award that arguably was the best solo
performance of the competition, at least according to Yanna and the many
comments from the audience.
But the other moments of joy came when dancing
Standard. Clearly my most challenging
dance form, Yanna is constantly asking me when I will start moving during my
lessons as I am famous for making tiny wimpy steps and going nowhere. We have worked on Standard over the past few
months, but there was no indication that any improvements were
forthcoming. With new Silver routines, I
was expecting to be tentative and unconvincing and had little expectation for
myself.
Again, I was proven wrong……as I was 100% wrong with every preconceived
expectation! My Standard dance heats were increasingly fluid, confident, and
comfortable. The Silver heats were
performed with increasing precision and a far cry from the miserable
performance displayed in the City Lights competition a month earlier. The open events were even more enjoyable and
I really felt the joy of dancing as the day progressed moving to the last of the
last heats. And my performance reflected
my joy.
I had no expectation for the Semifinal 3 Dance Scholarship
Silver Ballroom event, competing in a field of 2 other men and 6 ladies. Indeed, I have not had much of a record of
success even in the Bronze category, and the gentlemen that I was competing
against this day included the one that cleaned the floor with me in Smooth two
days prior and the one that was defeating me in Latin. I was calm and circumspect, and just tried to
have fun. I was rewarded by making the
cut to the final as the only male student, defeating one of the ladies and
displacing both men. Apparently this was
to be as far as I would go in this event. Nevertheless, I felt like I had accented
my week of hard work with a visible success, leaving on a high note, dancing in
my most difficult of dances, and floating off the dance floor on a cloud.
Final Dance Thoughts:
Ballroom dance competing is a lot of hard work sprinkled
with moments of fun and enjoyment. There
are a hundreds of things to order in your body, you need to remain alert and
navigate properly, remain confident when avoiding collisions or even when colliding
with other dancers, and somehow you must EXPRESS the joy of dancing in your
execution of the dance. There are many
mechanical dance professionals that cannot rise to the level of dance
expression that is required to be the best of the best.
But what I experienced on Saturday afternoon were fleeting
moments of comfort and fluidity and joy in dancing my standard dance heats that
were pure delight. Not consumed by any
concerns about frame, dance routine steps, navigation strategies and
contingencies, I became lost in the moment, no longer driving (or more
accurately dragging) Yanna on the dance floor following some preconceived cutout
path of movement, but rather being commanded by the music, flowing effortlessly
and synchronously in harmony with my dance teacher. A moment here and a moment there, but I think
this is what good dancers must experience every day and the reason why they
come back the next. It is an experience
that must be experienced, pure and magical and one worthy of the hard work and
effort and expense that one needs to commit before a taste of dance heaven is
revealed.
Appropriate Thank You’s…..
I want to thank Yanna for being TIRELESSLY patient with me
and to admit that I am an unworthy student but have the best dance teacher I
could ever imagine.
I want to thank Mark and Anna for dinner on Monday night and
your continued friendship as well as attending the wonderful Friday night performances
at the Heritage.
I also want to especially thank my sister-in-law, Frankie
Lou, another North Carolina native as well as Rita and Grace (daughter in law
and granddaughter) who trekked for hours to share Saturday night with me at the
Heritage and the Grove Park Inn. To Frankie
Lou, I can never repay you for what you have done for me, your unselfish and
endearing love of family including for my wife, your sister and the common sadness
we share in having lost our spouses that we live with each and every day.
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