I've had some quiet celebrations of reversing long-held chunks of identity over the past few months. Recently: language-learning, singing, motherhood (yeah, that was weird.) The last one was last weekend at late Friday night Chicago blues with Andrew (where we failed the Olin challenge with Elsa and Harold).
"Are you a dance minor?" asks the panting, grinning (excellent) strange lead who's just swirled me through a delicious, frenzied tangle on the wooden floor. Blues music starts to pour again; I have no idea how long we'd been dancing.
"Excuse me?" I manage to gasp between intakes of oxygen.
"A dance minor," he repeats. "Or something. You've had training. Most people can't keep up with anything like that; you're really flexible. It was a compliment."
"Thanks -- I'm not actually -- but thank you," I stammer, ducking out of the way of swirling couples. And he's gone, off to another dance, and so am I. Probably just being polite, I tell myself. "Flexible" is not often a word used to describe me. But two leads later, another gentleman: "Whoa, what other styles do you do? Are you a dance minor?" And so the compliments continued through the night.
WIN: I am a mover! The awkward, unathletic kid who wished she could be a disembodied brain-in-jar (it'd be much more convenient) grew up into a young woman increasingly comfortable and present in her body.