Kinesthetically

Until today.

As I walked down the steps into the adorable little dance studio, I took a deep breath. The walls, decorated in black and white damask with pink accents. The waiting room with cozy black couches and fuzzy black rugs. The two classrooms - one in the back and one in the front with a baby grand piano and with four windows near the ceiling so that passers by can just barely peek in at the dancers. It felt like home.

Slowly, I approached the woman behind the desk. My voice cracking and my Spanish wobbly, I explained I was there to sign up for the class that was about to start. She smiled, handing me the paperwork. And just like that, I'd done it! Four years, seven countries, three relationships later and I was finally there, on the verge of my first Contemporary class!

Had I danced Contemporary before, she asked me.

I'd danced Ballet. I'd experienced how it was akin to learning a musical instrument - the instrument of your body. I'd danced West Coast Swing. I'd experienceed it was akin to learning a new language - a language which you could carry on entire conversations in with another person without ever opening your mouth. But no,I'd never danced Contemporary. For four whole years I'd yearned to experience what it was like to move my body like my emotions moved around inside of me. To learn how to keep a kinesthetic journal for just myself without a single word.

An hour and a half later and I left that little studio beaming. Maybe to some I'd waited an absurd amount of time to push myself to do something so relatively small, but walking up those steps, I knew it'd waited the perfect amount. All along I had subconsciously been waiting for this day. Until I lived in a beautiful apartment in the middle of my favorite neighborhood in the middle of a country I adore, surrounded by friends and happiness. Only then could I have noticed this little studio just minutes from my home and been inspired to try something new.

The class was perfect. The teacher was wonderful and not only taught us movements, but explained the reasoning, technique and history of each one! The other girl (there were only two students in the class!) was extremely gregarious and giggled throughout the whole class when she couldn't get a movement correct. She talked to me before class and made me feel very comfortable in Spanish. And the dancing! It was exactly what I'd watched on repeat so many times in the music video. A few times I caught a glimpse of my arm or my foot or my back doing exactly what I'd seen that girl in the video do so many times and I couldn't but be enchanted by it all.

As I turned the corner from Calle de la Pez, that feeling bubbled up inside me. I looked back at the studio and forward towards my apartment, wonderstruck. How did I get here?! <3