oneword: middle

She stands in the middle of the room.  But it is not just any room.  It is a room, like so many other rooms, that has defined so many moments in her life.  

She stands there in the pit, the lowest point of the whole place, the point where a piece of the magic begins.  She turns to the back of the room, looking upwards over hundreds of battered, worn seats, seeing shifty figures and faces that have occupied them through the years.  She sees the tears and the laughter, the intense attention and the restless boredom, the family, the friends, the faces of people who made a regular moment wholly unique and irreplaceable, never to be found exactly as it was again.

Her eyes travel up past those seats to the doors which welcomed those faces in, to the booth which controls other pieces of the magic.  She lets her eyes travel across the high ceilings and up to the catwalk, caging in streams of light which illuminate and inform the magic, hanging from above the pieces that will bring people and moments to life.

Then, ever so slowly, she allows her body to turn, facing a gaping hole--dimly lit, empty.  The floor gouged, splintered, worn.  Remnants of tape and paint and blood, sweat, and tears sprinkle the surface which so many have occupied before her.  Remnants of successes and failures haunt the space before her.  

And she is not sure she belongs in this room, like she has in others from before.  The pieces of the past do not speak to her here, the pieces of this room are still foreign, strange.  She stands there looking, questioning, hoping, that before too long that strangeness will disappear.  She stands there hoping that the various pieces of the magic she knows so well will come together for her here.  

Because then, standing in the middle of things will feel less daunting.

oneword: change

Whipped through my world and knocked me on my ass. I was preoccupied at the time, and was taken aback. But the thing is...this change, this shift in my life...it's been a long time coming. And part of me knew it was on its way all along.

oneword: dance

This is the stuff that pulses its way through my veins. It flits and flurries, it leaps and crashes around my life. And the further away I get from a life centered around dance, the unhappier I get.

oneword: dance

first dance. last chance. quick ro-mance.

story of my life.

oneword: favorite

These are a few of my favorite things: winter night skies, the moon in any or all of its stages, the stars, the smell of the seasons, the breeze that envelops me, telling me that there is more in the world, the wisdom of ocean waves, laughter of all kinds and at all times, seeing love in someone's eyes, being silly and being serious, knowing that I am there for people just as they are for me, knowing that I am needed and relied upon, words, notes, movements, creative expression, the cosmic quiet occurring when it snows, the melting of a New England winter into spring, getting manicures with my girlfriends, dressing up and dressing down, going out on the town, being crazy and calm, wacky sarcastic interchanges, late night lucubrations and mad creations...

But my most favoritest thing of all...

Not knowing all of my favorite things until they take my breath right out of my lungs.

oneword: now

Now is the time for honesty, for coming clean, for moving forward. I cannot change what has happened. And I can no longer dwell in the past. I have to accept the decisions, the mistakes, and the hurts so that now will be haunted no longer--and a new now can step in, the real thing, the now I've been waiting for.  I must burn those bridges that keep me perpetually linked to a past wrought with drama and pain, filled with questions and unnecessary naysaying.  

Now has possibility and hope written all over it. But I have to grab it. I have to take this opportunity, own it.

Here and now. No excuses.

oneword: meant

what that meant was the end of an era. and even though i consciously never meant for it to happen, we will never be able to look at each other in the same way ever again. of all the things i've done that i am supposed to regret, i think this is the thing i am the most sorry for.