Anxiety

Encircled by a mix of good friends and strangers, I'm alone, standing in the middle of the room. The lights are warm; music is blasting, smiles all around, hands are clapping, "dance!" is shouted into the air. I'm supposed to be dancing, and everyone is watching to see what I'll do. My palms begin to sweat, my back slowly follows in suit; my pulse quickens and my throat tightens; I look down, flushed and embarrassed, and walk outside. "I can't dance."

That's never happened; but, seven months ago, it was my largest social fear. I wasn't someone who was meant to dance, I would tell myself. "Just do what comes natural," friends would say; standing around seemed natural to me, or simply bobbing my head -- perhaps groping a nearby companion would come to mind, but that's not polite, and so I refrained.

I used to dance all the time. I remember it well: I was five or maybe four or three. Couches created for the sole purpose of jumping upon were mine; Chicago was the band of the hour, sharing time with the Fame soundtrack; jumping, spinning, closed eyes, smiling. Stop. Switch. Embarrassment begins, expression ends. What if someone sees me? How horrifying. I'll sit for a while. Prom comes and goes; no, not for me.

There are some things people don't teach us early enough in life; but, to be fair to our elders and our peers, perhaps we're all still searching. After all, with the possibilities of the world before us, why else would we instruct our children to kill -- because we have it all figured out? Perhaps not.

In light of this, I propose an incomplete set of rules for life:

1. Rules are for those who don't know what they're doing.
2. If you have no fear then you're not a human being.
3. There is a short list of things that matter. What happens on a dance floor isn't one of them.
4. No one knows what one's doing.
5. Expression is a duty, not a right.
6. Don't worry about combining rules 1 and 4; just go with it.

Fear is real. It's inside me, now, as I write. It's about an inch in diameter. It's exact position is unknown, but, often times it's a projection; it hovers just below the top of the back of my neck, outside my body yet still a part of me, or in the invisible sphere that extends from the curve below my Adam's apple to the base of my neck. There is a transparent, dark-blue-near-violet-tinged force field surrounding it, constraining its expanse; it's about the size of a grapefruit, pressing on the fear from all sides, forcing its shape and size; the fear is discrete, solid, dark purple, and cannot be made smaller.

I like to watch it; it oscillates sometimes, or moves by chance. Without the force field, the fear would fall and shatter like a glass ball dropped from 327 feet, cutting into me, into me, forcing me to sit. Sometimes I hold it with both hands, shaking it like a snow globe to see what it will do. It spins and sways, gurgles, bubbles. I put it in my pocket, and it's light. It's mine.

After a short tango on Wednesday, I was told that I was becoming quite a good dancer. I said thank you. Another said she loves dancing with me. Hil-arious. Not that I disagree; in fact I love dancing with her, too; it's a riot, and we know it.

I started to swing in late June, out of obligation to my self; I wasn't going to die without having danced, first. A wedding in September -- surely an opportunity to dance -- merely provided the excuse to go through with it.

I had no idea what I was doing, but that's part of the point. You're with someone, on the floor, and that's all there is. You can't mess up; just have fun. Just dance.