Saturday, March 28, 2009

Can I just get a moment of self-indulgence...


I love to dance. Privately. When no one, and I mean NO ONE is around.
When I am my own private dancer, I win all the awards and competitions. But I am just too shy to ever share that with my adoring fan base.
I am, however, not shy to share something I am super proud of-dance wise that is.
I have included the link to my daughter dancing for her high school club, post high school, and in preparation for her bid at a scholarship/beauty/culture pageant in 2007.
A few things to know about Ms. Beenie...she is a VERY private person, so private in fact, I remember one of my sister's friends telling me that she had never met a kid who so thoroughly did not seek or seem to need an adult person's attention when in their company. She was 7 at that time.
I have never seen that, but I'm Mom, and I am always in her face.
But I digress. Beenie is private. She is very selective about when she dances in public. All the way up to this competition.
This dance in public, a solo dance that we call "taualuga" in Samoan, represents her hardest effort at a task or skill that she set her mind to. A skill I have yet to master myself.
Many of you may say, "Wasn't your Mom a dancer for PCC/Promo Team" in her younger days.
Yes. Yes. A thousand times Yes.
But that cultural dancing gene up and skipped me..and my sisters, if I may be so bold. (Note to my gentle readers, yes, all 4:Please do not think we can't get down on the club dance floor. The awkwardness is only in the realm of taualuga.)
This summer,however, I am having her work with me until my hands are graceful and my feet se'e like they've always known that movement and my body can bend and extend with the best of those Taupous.

1 comments:

Margaret said...

as they say in japan, "cuuute." good luck with the dancing lessons. we all privately seek that cultural acceptance. even inside samoan culture, only the special girls got picked to dance anyway. we would have lost on both counts. iilllll---flashbacks of my fa'asao fiasco where p-funk forced me to dance in an effort to break my spirit. it didn't work, but doing the taualuga was such a torturous 3 minutes that i refused to dance at one of my weddings 10 years later. lol. i still dance at the club tho! hope you are well. and blog more in between private dancing and self-indulgence, ua iloa?