Dancing Everyday

It's true that Art and Beauty are all around us in everyday objects like the graceful shape of a smooth, delicate egg or the bright collage brought home from school for Mother's Day. But on sunday I was treated to a performance that was Art and Beauty personified. In honor of Mother's Day, Hub got tickets for me and kidelette to see the Alvin Ailey dance company perform. It was so thrilling for me to witness such beauty and mastery up close. The dancers were strong, and graceful, and elegant, and bursting with movement and energy. The costumes were original and evocative. The individual dance pieces told stories and were full of emotion and humor and grace and beauty. My favorite piece was Suite Otis, which used the music of Otis Redding to present something brilliant and completely American in energy and mood. Ailey's well known piece Revelations was also on the program, and it was fantastic. The gospel music and the costumes and the dance moves expressing the African American experience in the South. The backdrop for one of the movements was a huge orange circle, which represented a merciless and blaring sun. Through the scenery and the dancers I could feel this harsh sun hotly glaring down on me. The whole program was just wonderful.

It might also be true that my Alvin Ailey experience with kidelette (who also enjoyed the dancing, but was starting to get fidgety towards the end...it was a 2 1/2 hr. show after all) has nothing to do with my good ole adventures in kookery, in an overt manner. In a subtle way I think it has everything to do with it. I was so inspired by the beauty and the artistry of the dancing and the dancers, every leap that they executed, every gyration, every swoop, every outstanding kick was full of life and filled with grace. Why not extend all that into everyday living? Why not make your salad a tour de force of freshness and flavor and originality? Each meal that is presented could be a statement of the food and of the way you feel about the people you are preparing the food for. Yes, it's probably unrealistic to think that the AA dancers go through their life blithely leaping and twirling as they do on stage, but they probably spend much of their time perfecting these moves and practicing this joy and vitality. Maybe I could do the same in my everyday life?