Relax

Today is tap class. I wait for it all week, the steps spinning round in my head, causing my feet to burst into a jerky kick-ball change or slap step at weird moments: in a grocery store check-out line, a parking lot, the tiled kitchen floor.

I am discovering, however, that tap dancing involves far more than learning steps and combinations. It is another reminder, for me, of the axiom: "How you do some things is how you do everything."  Tap dancing is the GPS to what makes you tick, how you go about your life learning new things, allowing yourself to grow, giving yourself permission to indulge in an art -- the mastery of which is light years away, and even then, will not result in a plum musical theatre role.

At the age of 55, I am still learning about life and how to navigate it.

The first lesson of tap appears easy: Relax.

Relax while making your feet perform steps you'll have to remember as part of a sequence, in eight-count timing and perfect unison with the rest of  your class, AND in front of an audience.

You can't fake this. A fake puts you a count behind or ahead. A fake helps you avoid learning the true step.

A fake messes up your fellow tappers.

Relax.

I have not relaxed from the moment my steel tap resonated off the tiled floor. All my concentration poured into mastering a slap, a shuffle, a rif, my big toes rigid as a cramp in the kid glove leather of my spectator tap shoe.

Consciously, I know my foot must resemble a wet noodle for an effective, snappy tap. But...how you do some things is how you do everything. I do not allow myself the slack to relax until I feel mastery of -- something.

Blame it on the nuns. Blame it on the curse of an over-achiever. Blame it on the hang-ups of a '70s "new woman."  (Remember this one, girls? "You can have it all.") It doesn't matter what's blamed for my inability to relax when I'm learning something new.

Relax and enjoy the process. The critical element in dancing across the floor with what appears to be no effort at all.  It's like the sugar my grandmother sprinkled into her tomato sauce to temper the tartness.

Relax.

I'll make a note it.