Click on photo for larger image. I am filled with excitement and nerves. I drive into the parking lot at the North Jeffco Community Recreation Center in Arvada, Colorado at 5:30 PM last Friday night. This is the main event of the season for the Rockyettes, a tap and Broadway dance ensemble. I am dancing tonight as a relatively new member of this group.
Earlier today, my hairdresser transformed my hair into a sassy style and put on stage makeup including the requisite red lipstick. There is something about red lipstick that encourages me to develop a different persona. I am sweating through my makeup on this hot summer afternoon.
I walk into the building and into the theatre where 260 chairs are set up for tonight’s performance. Fifty women dancers, mostly seniors, wait to rehearse the closing bows. Each dance group has its own timetable of when to go on stage and how to bow. The music of “Can-Can” is blaring in the background.
The rehearsal is over at 6:00 PM, and the doors to the public are opened. My husband, Tom drove separately. He waits in line with his two pans of homemade poppy seed coffee cake, baked from scratch by Tom himself, recipe courtesy of his late Czechoslovakian mother. This has become Tom’s signature recipe. Once people try it, they are addicted. It must be the poppy seeds.
My friend, Janet, calls earlier to confirm that a group of 17 people are accompanying her to tonight’s performance. I assume that the 17 are from her line dancing class. Ten other people confirm their attendance directly with me so now I am up to 27. I am stunned.
I am also surprised to see two men waiting in line that I knew from an accordion band that I played with several years ago. One of the men even had his accordion in tow because he was afraid that if he left the accordion in the car, the wax in the reeds would melt.
I proceed to the dressing room at 6:00, still astonished that so many people would choose to spend their Friday evening watching the dancing seniors. The Rockyettes performance begins precisely at 6:30 and ends exactly at 7:45. We move like clockwork, with beautifully designed costumes, different for each number. I dance in two of the Broadway dance songs.
When we enter the stage, I look directly into the audience. I cannot see anyone because the lights are turned down except for the stage lights, which are turned up. I see a silhouette of Tom who is snapping pictures at stage left. I dance and smile to the presumably full house, not knowing whom from those I invited are in attendance. The dancers are having fun and at that moment, everything else doesn’t matter.
After the finale of “Can-Can” and the closing bows, the house lights are turned on. I head off stage for the main floor to visit with friends and enjoy refreshments, including Tom’s coffee cake.
The biggest shock of the evening is seeing my accordion teacher and band director, Alice with her band members that I played with in my earlier Parkinson’s days. Alice conducts an accordion band every Friday night. The previous Friday, Janet (yes, the same Janet, a line dancer and accordionist who invited 17 people) informed the band that she wouldn’t be attending the following Friday because she wanted to see me dance. Alice’s and the band members immediate responses were “me too.” Alice cancelled band for the following week. In the 14 years that I have known Alice, she never cancelled band for any reason. This was a first for Alice.
And this was a first for me… While dancing tonight, I feel and look as though I don’t have Parkinson’s.
It seems like we are all dancing out of our comfort zones.
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