After the band dance, I came home, showered, and then watched Flashdance. Finally... But anyways, I couldn't sleep after that because I was thinking about dancing... I love it, so much... And just like Alex Owens, I haven't taken any classes. She wants to do ballet, which is a little different from me (although when I was five...), but still. I would probably get freaked out applying for a spot on a company if everyone else had gone to school for it for years and years. Good for her for finally going in! I keep sidetracking myself!! In any case, I was feeling kind of guilty for not noticing people at the dance. I went up to a few people who were just sitting around like why aren't you dancing? And they were all, "Oh, we've been out there..." And it's not like I should have noticed, I guess, but I felt bad for not noticing anyway, and kind of rude for approaching them about it. Emerging philosophical question: am I that self-absorbed when I'm dancing? So into my own thing that I barely notice the rest of the world? I don't like the idea of self-absorption - though I suppose if I'm asking this question now it's taking humility to a hubristic extreme. But for the sake of philosophy: I am a firm believer in the selflessness of art, as in the best art comes in moments of minimal self-awareness. Is my self-absorption while I'm dancing aware or unaware? Is it art or pride? I was thinking about that during the dance too, come to think of it... I thought the best kind of dancing is freestyling, yet the majority of the dance consisted of Heather and I and random other people coordinating someone else's moves, or some we'd developed and built up ourselves over time. So we requested a song especially for freestyling, and ended up doing yet another dance from a movie. I was in a minor panic. Stupid thing to freak out about, hey? If I had fun, though, does it really matter? The "funnest" - or most memorable, at least - parts were when everybody was on the floor goofing off. And Mike said he wished I could see myself dance, and that if he videotaped it it wouldn't come close to the real thing. I guess my main problem is that I worry too much, about everything. I don't want to approach other groups for fear of intimidating them or making them think I'm showing off (which I probably am, but whatever - I wish everyone would dance and not worry about what people think - I wish I would dance and not worry about what people think!) In my latest Madeleine L'Engle book, which I have not been able to read as much as I would like, the characters were talking about art in the sense of angels. Art, and someone's leading gift, they said, is about the struggle between the dark angel of destruction and the bright angel of creativity, and art comes when the bright angel prevails for a split second in time. The pianist then pointed out that the best pieces of music were written in times of darkness, when it would seem the dark angel was victorious. They also talk about the near impossibility of externalizing internal sounds, which can of course be applied to writing and painting as well. I wish I could externalize my internal images! If I could, I think I would be a wonderful painter. But I guess that's what art is all about. The ability to externalize. You could say all art derives from the same place in a person's soul and its external variety comes from the different specialties of externalization. Cool. The pianist also theorized that the dark angel and the bright angel are actually the same angel in "different guises." In this case, the bright angel of creativity would work out of the turmoil of the dark angel to produce paradise, and there we are, full circle. Isn't life funny? Incidentally, I made the world's fluffiest oatmeal muffins this morning. They are nearly impossible to eat, but they taste wonderful.