Susan Senator

Now that Dirt is finished, at least a good draft for shopping around, my agent wants to know what I want to do about the Fun book, the one where I talk about how to find fun and happiness while raising a challenging child. You could make a case that I am a person who has found a way to have fun, no? Even with the difficulties around disability, like navigating the school and the state systems, dealing with the public, dealing with issues no one can help you with, we all still deserve to live our lives to the fullest, and not just as defined by our children. We need our own time, our own hobbies, passions, evenings, etc. We have to figure out a way to get them, sometimes without leaving our livingrooms. Or without spending any money. It’s about closing your eyes and without judgment thinking about just what it is you want to do with yourself, what you wish, what you envy in others, even. All of our feelings, even the “ugly” ones, teach us something about ourselves.

I started bellydancing because I watched the Shakira video, “Hips Don’t Lie.” I was entranced with the way she moved. I felt a yearning, a pang, something missing in my life. I thought, “I want to be like that,” and I immediately then thought, “No, I can’t.”

That is when I knew that I should.

When I bellydance, I completely escape into a world of my own. I hear the songs in my head and I feel the moves I want to make. I watch the other women in my classes and I get lost in dreamy contemplation of how beautiful they are doing the steps just right (one of them has been dancing for 17 years and she is only in her early 30’s!). Last night, for instance, we learned this step that was incredible: three short steps on the diagonal to the right; three short steps on the diagonal to the left, with arms at midpoint going in an “S” shape to your body. Then you stop and do two complete turns, arms outward. Then you stand still, arms up over your head, hands outward. You look skyward in ecstatic contemplation of your arms and then you run them down, following the line of your body, eyes closed, hip shimmying the whole time. Then you thrust your arms upward and do vertical torso snakes to the right then the left. Then do the whole thing again.

It was so hard! And then I got it, by standing behind that really talented 30 something and imitating her — and it was magnificent!!! The teacher also broke it down for me, which helped. She is so funny, but she has the feel of bellydance in her blood, in the way she speaks. She says you thrust your hands outward while doing the initial steps and turns, as if to say, “This is for you, my audience,” and then, when you throw your arms skyward and shimmy it is as if you are saying, “But this — this is for me.”

And that is what life should be like. Some for you, and some that is just for me. We give and we take. That is what makes a complete, sane person. Find your own dance steps and make it happen! Then tell me about it!