Thoughts by Richard Bleil
As memory serves, I had been to a dance the weekend before. I was describing my dance partner, a young woman I had met at the reception to my friend, when he said, “not every dance has to be a pre-sin ceremony.” I replied saying, “if it’s done right, it does.”
To me, dance is life. Have you ever looked at videos of birds doing a mating ritual? They are very clearly dancing, and mating creates life. But, like the birds, you need some skill if you’re to be successful.
Before going any further, I should say that I don’t believe that sex is a sin. It can be used in sinful ways when it becomes a weapon to embarrass or shame another, but I don’t see how something that can be so much fun could be considered a sin by a merciful and loving God. The only organ known to science that seems to have no function other than joy belongs to women. Why would God create it just to forbid its use? No, sex cannot be a sin if the heart is pure in my opinion.
When they mate, bald eagles will fly to dizzying heights and lock talons. They mate while in free fall, refusing to break the death grip until the very last moment when they release, just shy of crashing to their death, and go their own ways. It’s an aerial ballet, twisting and falling, with their faith in their partner to release at the right time. I have to admit, I’ve had lovers I would not trust as much.
The reality is that, as I think of my lovers, I’m ashamed to have had most of them. There are some partners that I will always cherish, not just the memory, but of what they have become since, but most, if I had to do it over again, I simply would not. Hindsight is always twenty-twenty, they say, and I guess that’s true. At the time I was blinded with lust and desire, too foolish to see the actual person I was with, and too ready to be with, well, anybody to alleviate my loneliness.
I think I remember that dance. The dance floor was excessively crowded, and my dance partner and I had little more space than the area occupying our bodies. There was no way to do any dance moves, as a single step would collide with somebody else. I remember holding her tight to me and spinning. In a move that I probably could have never done off of the dance floor, I lifted her feet off of the ground and spun faster than I think I ever had before. She held tightly her head tilted back with laughter as we just spun in place.
There’ something about dance that is just different. At a dance club, they started playing the Beatles, the entire repertoire I know so well that I could never have trouble dancing to it. A rather lovely young woman was trying to make her way off the dance floor past me, and, okay, I was being a jerk. I was blocking her way (playfully) with dance moves as she dodged to get around me. I don’t think she was terribly upset by this, as I seem to recall her smiling at the game (and it wasn’t long before I did let her go her way), but my jumps and moves were ethereal. Never could I reach the heights when jumping as I did were it not for the Beatles that day.
Birds show off their skills, and their beauty in their dances. It’s not just plumage and physique, but skill, and most importantly, confidence. Those two dances made me feel invincible, as if I could do anything, and I showed it off. Recently I’ve happened upon a dance studio not far from where I live. My friend’s daughter will be getting married soon (it’ll be small, so I won’t be getting an invitation which is fine). I’m sure that she and her fiancée are currently taking dance lessons, as this is pretty typical for couples to do so they can shine on their “first dance”, but honestly, I wouldn’t mind taking dance lessons myself. I’m not crazy about dances with rules, like line dancing that tell me exactly what to step where and what to do, but I wonder if I should see if they take creepy old men as clients. I can tell you that it is also good exercise, which is another reason an old man with a bad heart like me should do so.
I will never understand men who don’t like dancing, especially if they have somebody with whom to dance. I guess everyone is different, but dance is life. This lesson I have learned from the birds.
Bleil's Banter 