In the art of her becoming (dancing with Miss M.)

I'd always thought that I'd have one of those rambling, big families—a couple of boys and a couple of girls.  Instead I was given the greatest son a mother could ask for.  Light emanates from him.  Wisdom, too.

Still, being the mom of one has raised up the aunt in me; I am, I will confess, that woman (yes, that one) who seeks out friendships with those who, by virtue of their age and their perspective, their fearlessness and hope, are so much smarter and livelier than moi.  I'm the neighborhood crazy (as some have called me) who brings the kids into her home to talk words and books.  I'm that lady with the camera snapping shots of kids hanging from trees or sledding down hills or bringing water up a hill.  I'm that professor who stands crying in the classroom at the semester's end, and I'm that blogger standing in awe of the young talents who reach out to me.

I'm useless, really, but that's the thing: these young people forgive me.

I was thinking about all of this last night as I took a cha-cha lesson with a golden-haired eleven-year-old I'll call Miss M.  She's got the cha-cha down already, see, while the rest of us need far more practice.  We need patience, too, and Miss M. has that.  We need to know what she knows, and she shows us.  "What was that again?" we'll ask her, and she'll say, "It's the basic, and then the New Yorker, and then the chasse and the alemana."  "Hmmm," we'll say, and she'll demonstrate, without an ounce of arrogance in her.

Miss M. will make an astonishing teacher someday, but before that, she's going to wow the dance world with her dancing.  I feel rather privileged to know her right now, in the art of her becoming.