MOOP!

Youth Trad Song: The Annotated Ephemera edition!

( about 1700 words and a lot of images! But it is as complete a con-report as you'll get. )

It was a good weekend, and honestly, I think this sufficiently covers what all I did. Any time not covered by the above was probably spent cuddling and chatting with my friends, and singing all the nice songs they were leading.

~Sor
MOOP!

1: It is me, if I were a half-centaur, half-minotaur.

2: She is my nemesis and was fool enough to tell me the etymology of her last name. Honestly, usually I refer to her in my head as "Laurie Sheepfucker" because that has a much better ring to it, but technically it is not fucking the sheep, it's getting them to fuck each other. Hence.

Original Tags: how can I keep from singing?, conreports

Merry May!

Despite having lived less than a mile away for all four years of college, and within five miles of Harvard Square the subsequent twelve years, this is the first time I've ever made it to the May Day festivities!

Context: it's first of May, first of May, and the morris dancers are out a'dancing in order to make sure the sun rises and the harvest is bountiful or whatever it is exactly morris¹ dancers do. There was a Maypole and singing and a big ol' circle dance and several performances by various local teams!

There were like...100? 150? people there, to dance and sing and hang out and lean on each other tiredly. I biked in with Elishka, which was splendid for so many reasons, not least of which was having made this plan in advance, we were both stuck with it for fear of disappointing the other, and so we both rolled out of bed at stupid in the morning to head out. It was also a good plan because she actually knew where we were going --I knew the optimal route to Harvard (since my college was literally next door, and indeed, I gave her the tour² as we biked past) but she got us the rest of the way once we were in the square.

I saw many people I knew, which was very pleasant! Elishka commented that she might've known more bellringers present³ than contra dancers, which was a very funny and not false observation. I spent lots of time chatting with Elena, and some time chatting with Martin, and was pleased as punch to see Neil⁴ and Iz and of course I said hi to all the morris friends in passing -- Laura and Amanda and Gillian and Sam and Lisa. Avalon was the first one to say hi to us, and I was unfortunately overwhelmed by their enthusiasm at 0'dark'thirty, but was good to hear them sing.

My biggest conclusion is that next year I need to figure out that obviously this is an event that I dress like I'm going to FaerieFest. Except I've biked home and had just enough time to eat some breakfast and type this out, so that would be a pretty quick turnaround if I had to also change into work-drag.

It was a really nice start to the day, month, season. And now I go off for work --seven weeks left, but who's counting?

~Sor
MOOP!

1: Do we capitalize "Morris Dancers"?

2: "I lived on that street for two years and that street for one year and in that tall building for one year annnnd now we're on Harvard's turf."

3: I think we had minor? Elishka, Kyle, Rachel, me, Mira, Arthur, Laura? Rachel and Mira were the two that showed up with bells on though, so bonus points to them!

4: Looking far more dapper than the rest of us, since this was "late night" instead of "early morning" for him, and also he had an *amazing* leather coat that looked real good on him.

Hullo friends! I have been writing lots of accomplishment posts, but I don't think I have written very much regular posts recently. Here are some disconnected random things about me right now!

***

Somewhere in the very recent past, I decided that Now That I'm Thirty¹, I no longer give a shit whether Those Dudes think I'm a bitch or not. This has involved me speaking up a little more in various places, and then wandering off as soon as I get bored, because unlike some dudes, I have sufficient self-control to not keep showing off my ass to the entire damn world. It's *great*. Not caring if Those Dudes think I'm rude is the *best* and I highly recommend it.

It is all made better by the presence of my trusted Partner in Petty, my darling baby sister who gets all the screencaps I think are too hilarious not to share. Anyways, if you're worried about incurring my wrath, it's pretty easy not to: if someone calls you out for doing something iffy, suppress whatever your knee-jerk reaction is, go somewhere else, think for a while, and then come back. Sure, sometimes they might be Objectively Wrong. But we all benefit from more time to consciously think before posting.

***

I've wandered back into doing Highland on the semi-reg, which is working out pretty damn well for me. It turns out Serious Aerobic Exercise Wot Gets Your Heart Going is good for a body and soul. Even if I remain terrible at it and it is very frustrating.

Possibly related to the point above, I have been getting better at saying to Robert "hey, you need to teach this differently for me to learn it" (which almost always is "much more slowly please", and occasionally is just "no I don't have questions, I just literally need to practice it thirty times in a row please and thanks".)

ANYways, I've almost got most of Bonnie Dundee, as long as you ignore the arms entirely. And tonight! TONIGHT WE STARTED THE JIG! Okay, so like, there's a very small number of actual "Highland" dances that get done in competition and stuff. Then there's a whole bunch of "National" dances. I'm not very good at remembering which are which beside the really obvious ones.

There are two competition dances that you don't get to do AT ALL as a beginner, because they are Too Hard. They are the Hornpipe and the Jig and they basically are the two MOST AWESOME Highland dances. They have very different feels to everything else (Jig especially, which is meant as a giant angry Irish stereotype and all the movement is so precise) and if we're gonna be working on Jig in the near future I'm gonna pull out all the stops to actually make it to practice!

***

My bike has a big fucking hole in the tyre, such that you can see the big fucking hole in the toob. No one likes this, least of all me. I need to figure out how to get my bicycle to quadbikes, which is all the fuck in Harvard. Everything is Very Sad And Dramatic.

On the plus side, I saw Neil the other night at dance (!!!!!!!) and he mentioned they still have my other bike, which I left there like a year ago and thought I'd lost to the ADHD tax. So that's exciting! Just have to get my shit together! Big time shit together!!!

***

In general, Becoming Effective is possibly working in a very small way? I just described it to Dragon as "it's slow but it is going" and that's pretty accurate.

The accomplishment posts are probably really good for me, although they feel cluttery on the page. Maybe I will revitalize my old "SorSpeaksWords" guilt-free spam-journal. Or at least start putting them under cuts? I dunno.

I hate everything about progress, apparently. Also the sleep part is absolute crap. This week I'm pretending that if I focus instead on drinking enough water it won't matter.

Hope you are well!

~Sor
MOOP!

1: I am older than 29.5, I can start rounding! Although seriously, mostly due to my distaste with societal pressure for people (especially women) to lie about their age and "29" being the age to quote, I have been going with "almost thirty" the entire year, because I'm much more into that.

Accomplishments:

Work:
*Roughed out the rubric for my Data Analysis students' final project.

Bells:
*Did not make a QP, but at least that was a whole-band thing and not just a me thing
*Did get to ring treble to just *bunches* of different stuff, that was a lot of fun!

Social:
*After bells, we all headed over to Dale and Emily's new house for their housewarming! Their house is SO GOOD! It is full of twisty passages and closets and easy to get lost in and it was totally great.
*Played with small children a ton, which is A+
*Also chatted with adults I like a ton, which is also A+
*Then I went to my dance-mom's surprise 60th birthday, which was a roaring success!

Dance:
*Got to do some spontaneous random contact-improv with Harsh, who I described to a mutual friend as "yeah, we just have very compatible body-grooves" or something like that. I think it's a good way of saying it --there wasn't even any music, but the two of us have very cooperative dance brains which makes it a ton of fun to dance with him.
*Got to dance Tuchas Long Enough, which is the objectively best dance I've ever helped write (sorry Pinewoods Eel).
*Called the Scottish Country Dances for a room full of mixed modern-English-International-etc dancers. They went really well! My sheer force of will for teaching beginners continues to serve me well.

Personal:
*There are no good accomplishments here. But such is life, alas!
*(I did write my words)
*(I did then write an accomplishments post)
*(I will try to do some email, and certainly do it tomorrow if not).

~Sor
MOOP!

((This is the essay I've been meaning to post since Flurry --really, more of a narrative. UMYEAH. In the interest of not babbling like an idiot, I don't have any author's notes to preface it with. That's what footnotes are for.))

The Penultimate Waltz
(An essay detailing the happenings of my finest dance this weekend, and a short analysis of the three minute intimate experience.)

In the course of my dance weekend, I had a chance to discuss with a tango instructor the melancholic sensuality of dance. "A three minute deeply intimate experience" he described it, and, catching on to the poetry of the words, stored that thought into my head for later use.

The later use came earlier than expected, the next day, at the end of a contra set. Scouting the hall for someone to dance with, I saw a very vaguely familiar face with a button --"I give hugs".

"Hello, want to dance, and don't I recognize you from NEFFA?" We reintroduced ourselves and joined a set, and I crossed my fingers deep in the back of my mind and prayed, as I always do, that he would be a good partner, and this would be a good set.¹

(In contra, the first is far more important than the second, and indeed, unless you are very lucky, there will almost certainly be those you find distasteful, or at best, merely uninteresting.)

So we begin to travel up the set. It is, in a word, exceptional. He is good and I am good and we are Good together.⁴

That was, unbeknownst to us, the last contra, and after the last contra always comes the Last Waltz. All around us, couples were forming. I waited a polite moment, then went ahead and asked him if he knew how to waltz.

I've danced with many waltzers, some good, some great, some exceptional. He was, perhaps, merely good, slightly on the inexperienced side⁵ but he had an excellent sense of rhythm and as we danced I found myself drawing steadily closer, to press more against him. He did not pull away -our chemistry palpable to us both.⁶

We ended, and he pulled me into a hug. (Or perhaps I pulled him, it matters not.) The dancers around us whooped and cheered the music, but we had a mutual reluctance to let go of one another. As I leaned close to him in our hug, I found courage to go ahead and ask -"Would it be impudent of me to ask to kiss you?"

(I am nothing if not terribly polite)

He answered in a positive manner, and our lips met, sweet and warm and wonderful. We pulled apart as the dance dispersed, a slight blush tinting both our cheeks.

"See you at NEFFA" I called as we trailed off in our separate directions, though I think, even if we did, the world will not be the same. But for that three minute intimate moment, nothing mattered but being there and dancing together.

The Last Waltz is meant to be the important one, the one you save, and Dance Flurry ended with one more set of contras and a truly last waltz. But for this festival, of all the dances I danced, that final festival waltz meant nothing compared to the dance (and the kiss) before it --the penultimate waltz.

((Written 15 February 2009))

~Sor
MOOP!

((Postscript, written 8 May 2009:

I danced with him at NEFFA, but we didn't wind up kissing --I may have been slightly distracted at the time. (*coff*) I danced with him last night, being as he was my ride to Concord and whatnot. Ladies⁷ don't kiss and tell.

He remains probably the best contra dancer I've ever met though. Sorry all the rest of you, 'struth. I've ended a contra with him and been unable to think for a couple minutes --I think the only other person who's ever done that to me just through dancing is Magus, and his glorious waltzing.

...now, to get him into a skirt...>.>))

---

1: Holy run-on, Batman! This is one of the big problems with whenever I try to be prosey --I get a bit ridiculous². Also, the line was originally "prayed to the true goddess of dance, for I am merely demi³" but that's perhaps just a bit obscure.

2: I am -well, ridiculously- proud that I have finally figured out how to spell this word.

3: Long ago, mek had heaps and heaps of assorted titles --four altogether, I think, although I can only remember three of them right now. (Ritzy the Anti-Strag, Fiend of Vile Falsehoods, and Crackers of the Pointy Tortilla Chips) At some point, I complained about the fact that I disdn't have any titles at all. Shortly thereafter, I received a letter addressed to "Sor, the Demi-Goddess of Dance". Whether or not I 'deserve' that title is an essay for later, but at the time, it made me incredibly happy.

4: 'k, I was gonna go verbatim from my notebook, but I'm not sure what the hell I was writing here. Yes, that's partially because I was in a car when I wrote this and so can't really read my handwriting. Just know that it was a really unbelievably amazing dance.

5: Sooo tempted to revise this, but it'd be a lie. He is a perfectly fine waltzer, but between Magus and Larry, I have been completely spoiled for merely "fine."

6: Dear Sor. Never write prose again. No, *seriously*. Love Kat.

7: I am not a lady. I am a gentleman, however.

Original Tags:
bestof, dancing, unfiled people-fen, writings, unfiled people-alsoreal, tagged, i-have-a-crush-on-every-boy, i-love-being-poly, gendersex, sexuality, magus, i-write-good-shit: personal

Today is Wednesday.

Tonight is Wednesday night. My nefarious plans for tonight involve visiting jere7my and getting one last round of bad movies in before I go home for the summer.

Tomorrow is Thursday. I will spend the day doing things, at least one of which I hope to be studying for my Italian final. I will spend the night doing contra over at the Concord Scout House --come say goodbye!

The day after that is Friday. I have a final from ten to noon, and then will hopefully spend much of the rest of the day packing.

Saturday, no finals, more packing. Saturday afternoon and evening I am going over to the Belmhouse to babysit and hang out. Eventually I will detangle from there, go back on campus, and collect all members of the Lesley University Chaos Club who want to go see Rocky Horror.

Get home at late o clock, go sleep somewhere. Sunday morning, collect people to go get "breakfast" (ideally at noon or one) at Mr. Crepes. Steal Ria and/or Maddie on secret missions that I may or may not have alluded to last post.

After secret mission, study for maths. Pack more.

Monday, take maths final. Pack. Pack a lot. Pack like an *absolutely* crazy person, and as stressedly as I can possibly manage. Hopefully finish packing before it's time for dance.

Monday night, go dancing at Springstep for the last time for four months. Try not to think about it too hard, as it might make me cry. Dance with dance-Andrea, since I promised her a dance, dance with...other people. Get in a Last Waltz¹ with Magus that'll have to last me most of a summer. Hopefully stop being such a gloomcookie all the time.

Tuesday morning, go to my Teacherfinal, which consists of "showing up". (Or, you know, have flu like symptoms and stay home in order to better achieve the rest of the day.) Say goodbye to Evan, and school-Andrea and Erin and whoever else is around. Go back to Dock 18, say goodbye to the roomies. Cry, because, well, it's *me*.

Give mom a hug and toss things into Catbus². Stop by Belmhouse, thank them roughly a million times for letting me leave things there over the summer. Drive to Maryland.

Arrive in Maryland. Give Shan a noogie and Alys a hug. Curl up in my own bed, in my own room, with a door that closes. Try very very hard not to think about how long four months is, really.

Wednesday.

Visit Veronica. See if I still have a job. Be back in Maryland.

Sigh.

((And I mean there's good in there -Balticon, Tho, Origins, Day Camp, visiting mek, Otakon, Oella --not to mention all the Maryland people I love and adore. But seriously. Sigh.))

~Sor
MOOP!

1: There's symbolism to the Last Waltz, youknow? No, not always or anything, but your traditional Last Waltz, you do it with your sweetie (well, one of them. We're ignoring the polydrama for the purposes of this). Out of all of dancing, that's the one that really matters --a good partner, and the world becomes Just Right.

I wonder who my final waltz was with at NEFFA last year. I know for this year, and while I had a last waltz at Dance Flurry, the role of the Last Waltz was filled by the Penultimate Waltz.

Andumyeah. Stuff. LOOK A DISTRACTION, BYE!

2: Mom's van. Galileo was the old one, and we haven't changed plates, but the minivan I do most of my driving in is called Catbus.