Asking for the Truth

Every once in a while, you just want the truth. You need it. So that today, which began with a pre-dawn, sleep-deprived Zumba at the gym, advanced into corporate work, fell toward housework, slipped into a panic, and somehow spun toward a dance lesson, honesty was required.

"I feel as if I'm doing something wrong, and that no one will tell me what that is," I told Jean, during a quickstep lesson. "It's like everybody knows, except for me."

"Well," he answered, looking me straight in the eyes, not pausing, not beating around the bush, not acting as if I hadn't stepped forward with the question. "It's about posture. It's about confidence. It's about the way you plant your feet on the floor. When you think about it, you get it right. But when you don't, you fall back into your old way of dancing. You look as if you are looking for something. You don't stand perfectly straight."

And of course I wish that I did it all better. Of course I wish that I had dancerly wings. But today, this day, I was glad most of all that someone had not pushed me off, had simply said: I will tell you the truth.