I have one big regret in life. Just one. I stopped dancing. I don’t mean that I gave it up like a nun in the 1950s permanently gives up sex (visions of Jessica Lange in a habit with a ruler wearing a garter belt are flooding my mind), I mean that I stopped going to dance class. I never stopped dancing. To this day, just this morning in fact, I create dance in my mind while listening to music. I was making guacamole with my entire body in rhythm to the music. I make up elaborate city street dance choreography complete with cameras on swinging cranes swooping around me to capture my come hither, fuck off or “isn’t this so much fun!” face (the 3 staples of modern street dance) because it’s much more fun to do it for the camera and imagine that I’m a triple threat: actress, singer and dancer. Growing up, friends would bust on me (I don’t think “bust” is current in the youth lexicon) because I was a pop music kid. Some of them wanted to listen to the Grateful Dead and classic rock. Oh great. Dancing like a hippy is not going to get Janet’s attention. I just wanna hear a good beat as Lady Miss Kier would say. Without that, music seemed pointless. If there wasn’t potential for a chair dancing scene a la “Miss U Much” I wasn’t having it. No, the music wasn’t calling out social and political injustices or little ditties with lyrics about precious hearts and glitter stardust to strumming guitar hands and bongos (flash forward to me at Phish shows dancing like a dream warrior named Fee). These were anthems about getting up off your ass and owning the war zone that is the dance floor. I was more of a shake that ass, drop down and get yo’ eagle on dirty beats and soul groove kinda fella. Stuff your patchouli up your ass hippies. I wanna get my freak on. Le freak, so chic.
I have that one regret in addition to one big mistake. The mistake was to start smoking cigarettes. Three months ago I quit smoking. Can I get an Amen? The catalyst for the change was a night in the ER because I picked up a wicked case of bronchitis. Not just a nasty chest cold. Next level shit, the kind that scared the pants off of me. Have you ever not been able to breathe? For me, the breath is where I go to get grounded. I had a moment where I started to panic because I couldn’t breathe. My lungs just weren’t working. I panicked and when I went to my resource to calm me down, the one that I teach others can be their best resource, that we all carry with us, accessible at all times, my breath just wasn’t there. It left me. Breath is life and mine was lost like a concrete slab dragging me down to the bottom of a lake in slow motion.
That was the end of smoking. My little bastard friend that was with me since the college days. Ever since I started drinking. There’s nothing like a cocktail, conversation and smoking cigarettes. Well, there is one thing. They will kill you. I know that. I read the posters. I hear the PSAs. But for me, I needed to have my breath taken away from me. It wasn’t a coincidence. The idea was to quit for my 40th birthday. Yeah, happy birthday to me, Give up this fucked up thing that I connect with happiness and fun. That’s right happiness. I loved smoking a cigarette. But now at nearly 40, everything is shifting, reframing. I love my breath so much more than that cigarette. The happiness of smoking was a terrible illusion. I knew that my bout of bronchitis just as I was beginning to face the fact that I must quit because my life depended on it, was my final warning. I hadn’t been listening to the whispers. I was an addict. Everything single part of my day ultimately revolved around when I could next smoke a cigarette. Addicted to cigarettes. Addicted and warped around it to the point that my dad survived lung cancer from smoking and I kept on puffin'. Youth can be ingnorant and I was a dumb twit in my 20s and 30s. If you’ve never been addicted to cigarettes and the entire culture of smoking you don’t know what it’s like. Just like if you’ve never been addicted to food, drugs or alcohol or another person or another thing, you don’t know what it’s like. Think the next time you "Ew" or eye roll someone doing something that you don't approve of. I'll try if you try too.
I had some shame around smoking. It was a secret. Not completely but enough to have shame. My parents didn't know. They don't know. I still don't think they need to know everything but this is my digital confession booth so Ce La Vie. I have to remind myself that I'm not a kid. I'm just a healing arts practitioner who was killing himself. Believe me, I wasn’t some dick who told other people to not smoke. It was a non-issue. I didn’t talk about it. I just did it and didn't do it depending on the situation. Believe me, there was a time (many years ago) when I was smoking a pack a day. Eventually, as I moved to a few a day which is where I was for the past many years (the big shift was when I truly dedicated my time to bodywork), I called it my last fucked up thing leftover from another era (french fries and snark will never die) that I needed to deal with eventually. Yeah, eventually. But, addiction is a asshole. I would have occasional clear moments during my time as a smoker when I would be gentle with myself, reminding myself that I’m not perfect. I loved it and hated it at the same time. I wanted to punch it in the balls and hug it so hard. I’d had a friend in the past say it straight up to me, “How can you smoke and be a massage therapist?” Wanna know how and why? Because I’m human. We’re all human. Intrinsically imperfect yet somehow holding each other to unachievable mythical perfection. You have your shit and I honor it. I have my shit, maybe you can extend some loving kindness too. You never know what battles another fellow human is facing. Here’s where that non-judgment skill comes in handy. That, and a little thing called empathy.
I may not get a chance to catch Janet’s sweat beads in my eyeball as I dance behind her, but I did have the chance to come out the other side of a really nasty addiction. I was about to type habit. But it was so much more than that. This is my confession.
I’m still pissed that MTV stopped playing music videos 24/7. Thank god I can get my fix of Janet ruling her Rhythm Nation of Nasty Boys or Beyonce leading her regalia of girls ruling the world on You Tube. Turns out that’s much more fun than smoking a cigarette and the only thing shameful is the size of my grin as I watch.
Please Note: The rigors of a 3-day graduate school intensive made days 3 & 4 impossible to write. Next up, 5 days of writing from Mount Madonna retreat center in Monterey-ish, CA.