mabuhay ang dance/blog!: goodbye, little boy blue

The Saga of the Coronary Man is a short ballet made for a doctor's convention; the Coronary Man dances the tango with his friends when his heart stops. He flashes back to his childhood where his parents are fighting, drinking and smoking, and very much influences the man he grows up to be. At present, a heart surgeon, his attending physicians and three nurses in the cutest costumes, try to revive him. When they clean up his heart, an aerobics instructor teaches him to live healthily. The ballet ends as the Coronary Man convinces his friends to convert to healthy living as well.

Whenever anyone says we're dancing Saga, the response is always an incredulous groan.

Actually, though I find the entire thing a travesty, I like dancing the tango part. The choreography is pretty good and the tango is always fun. Also, I had danced the tango with Nino (I had even written a short piece about that experience) and of course I liked doing that.

Actually, I realize how much I really liked dancing with Nino, now that he's gone - a sort of Big Yellow Taxi thing. My new tango partner is Peter, who still has a lot of training to do with regards to partnering. It used to be so easy to dance this tango, and so fun and so cool that Nino and I can flirt without worrying that we'll dance it wrong. Now I have to make alalay that Peter won't drop me, I have to remind him of the step if he forgets, I have to carry my weight more than usual because if I don't, he will drop me.

Yes, I'm worried that Peter will drop me. Actually, I expect it.

Rehearsing Tango and wishing I was dancing it with Nino again also made me realize how important Nino was to me this last year. I was a few weeks ago mourning the demise of a relationship I really wanted to work, and much of it was mourning myself because I had felt so unloved for a big chunk of time. But I realized it's not true, I was loved a lot - maybe not by the man who was supposed to be loving me officially. But, as Kitch once told me, we're lucky for any amount of love that we get.

I used to feel really guilty about liking Nino this much, but now I understand that I really did need him when he was there for me. And not only because he was sweet and paid attention to me. The best part about the entire Nino thing was he made dancing fun. Well, dancing is really fun, period, but I had never really been in love while dancing before and he allowed me to experience what it felt like. It wasn't just the nice companionship during the tours and canteen breaks, it wasn't just the flirting onstage, it wasn't just the nice conversations about dance while waiting for rehearsal in the studio and in the dressing room, it was also dancing with him and feeling an affinity for a partner with whom you matched on several levels, physically, mentally, emotionally. It was sad when he first left the company as it signalled the end of an era. I decided it was good because we would never work as a couple. We could be happy for a while, but I would hate how obsessed he was with money and how warped his priorities are. He would eventually want women younger and more nubile than me. Etc, etc, etc. Waya once asked me, "Do you think it will work outside of ballet?" My immediate response was "But there's nothing outside of ballet!" I have come to realize that I was just being idealistic and it will never survive outside ballet. But it was nice when it happened.

Now, while I must endure having to go through each combination thoroughly with Peter, I also understand that I'm on to a new phase in my life. I read somewhere that everything I need only comes to me at the right time. The universe is really taking care of me.