Some friendships are based on words, on letters, on knowledge, on a turn of phrase, the choice of reading, the furious discussion over ideas or theories or ideals. Other friendships require different sustenance; the chance drinking partner, tuned into the familiar rhythm of the regulars in the bar, the life-strong friendship forged on the end of a rope, or from falling backwards over the side of a boat, bubbles racing the mess of flood tide, eyes wide, fingers round in a big OK, torch playing over the bottom of the alien underwater world.
There are intellectual sparring partners, action friends in constant motion, there are friendships forged through fire, ice, adversity, heartbreak. Our particular friendship has elements of all of these but was truly sealed in that visceral sweet spot between speakers, the booming bass reverberating through our ribs, at 120 beats per minute, arms in the air, smiling with strangers, in the happy clappy dance crazy warehouses of the 90s.
My favourite memory is the time I drove down South, to the crazy commuter town that lived for the wild, wild weekends. I pulled up outside your house and you grabbed me out of the car and tipped a glass of champagne straight down my throat. The quaint little house was already pounding, literally shaking with deep bass, you ran me a bath and washed my back, all the while administering the perfect cocktail of alcohol, nicotine and caffeine as we got dressed for the night. Standing in the queue for Clockwork Orange, surrounded by the beautiful people, I felt like a right Hicksville special. The bouncers were choosey but something about our motley crew must have shone with the devotion to dance and we were picked out and ushered through.
Then that moment, the best moment of the night, the moment I still crave in my dreams, when you step through the door and are stopped in your tracks by the wall of heat and light and music, pulsing so loud that it’s palpable. The flashing lights and the smiles and the shapes all coalesce into one enormous adrenaline rush as you step out onto the floor, morphing into the tribe, hips starting, feet sliding, smile growing, until you feel the beat in your heart and that little background buzz turns into a full on high, just endorphins and anticipation, and your hands go up for sheer joy.
You danced on the podium and the dragon on your back, the amazing dragon, based on the line drawings from the Hobbit, the beautiful greys and blacks and blues, danced with the sway of your hips. There was our motley crowd, the gambler, the gardener, the geek, open-mouthed, eyes wide, arms waving, following the dragon, they were our tribe, our family, and our soul mates. House music took us around the country; Clockwork at theCross, the Honeycomb, Cream at Nation, Renaissance, the Hacienda, Heaven at the Arches, Sex at Garlands, but for me it was always back to Cream. Dance was our church, where we found redemption and release from the mundane confines of daily life, breaking out from the gilded cage.
I don’t go out dancing often any more, but there are other sorts of hedonism, many other ways of recapturing that bliss. The body is an instrument, use it every way you can, and when you tune it and play it and learn to exalt in it, life can no longer grind you down.
Rock dancing, the perfection of pulling through a move that looked implausible, as feet push and arms strain and tendons scream and all the while the heart is slow and the breathing centred, as you pull down and live again.
Snow dancing, putting down a perfect set of tracks in powder, knees popping, thighs burning, floating on the edge of control.
Cloud dancing, skipping along Crib Goch on an inverted winter’s day, the horseshoe spread before you, smoke from friends houses tangy in the air.
Or the nearest feeling, on those rare days when running is easy, when legs and heart and arms and lungs all pump in time, when the ground falls away and trees glide past, when effort becomes meditation and every fibre of your being resonates with your heartbeat, that is the closest feeling to dancing.
And in those moments of hedonistic bliss, I can still catch your eye, thousands of miles away across the world, I feel your smile as the tempo rises higher and we step it up a beat, and I am once again dancing with the dragon girl.
copyright Dec 2009
For Annie- I wrote this for you in my head yesterday, yomping over Elidir Fawr with the whole of Wales spread out beneath my feet….. I miss you sweetie!!!
