I still don’t get why my body doesn’t do the dance moves I see.
I’ve done my best to keep up with the latest booty-hop moves since the mid 90s. My bathroom mirror being my only spectacle, I tried my hips at tootsie rolling, pop locking, train riding, etc. To date dance steps make me nervous. Learning from snippets of music videos I saw at friends’ homes was not enough practice. Friends with cable and the freedom to explore their cultural expression were my salvation. After school, I scurried home past dance sets and band practice where black girls my age were perfecting and showcasing their craft. My dreams of using gyrations at the next school dance, crushed. The only semblance of womanhood that I could capture were my mother’s side hip tick-tock motion that connected to the conga drums of salsa. And by salsa I am referring to the Chiquita Banana theme song. The secret wink she gave me as her hips swayed seemed to pass along an unseen spirit of fun. The ritual of “hips don’t lie” stayed with me.
Maybe dance fever can only be transmitted at backyard battles with cousins visiting for the summer. You show me the north and I’ll show the south. The dance belongs to the tribe.
I still don’t get it 