Impatient Patients

I can't believe the incredible thick bureaucracy of the medical system! My husband and I just spent six and a half hours in the hospital trying to get two different kinds of scans done. My husband has been dealing with brain cancer for two and a half years now, with a recent recurrence this summer. So while waiting two hours for his second scan of the day, a CT scan, we also find out that a particular conversation between two of our doctors, regarding an important transfer of information, has never transpired. We've been waiting for three weeks for information to pass between these two. How FRUSTRATING! My husband's treatment is waiting on all these people to get COORDINATED! Meanwhile the cancer cells grow... Really, what kind of person do you have to be to get efficient medical treatment in this country? A Senator?

Here's hubby's blog: http://brain.fraczard.com/

So how can I continue to be an artist during all this? Jon says that knowing I'm following my path is what keeps some sense of sanity in our lives. I keep grasping for threads of integrity. How can I spend so much of my time in a field that seems so narcissistic and ego-centered? By telling myself that I'm investigating embodiment - how can we live in our diseased bodies in this toxic environment with any hope of Grace. I'm looking for Grace.

Which brings me to Flow theory and my project incorporating Flow into the choreographic process. It's an odd task I've set for myself and my dancers... finding this expansive state of mind and body during a creative process. What I'm finding is that the Flow state is really more accessible at the beginning of the process – in the improvisational stages – and in performance. The middle is full of nuts and bolts dance crafting. But we keep our Flow lens on, attending to the 'how' of the making and hope that it will all make sense in the end.

My Dances Dance Me

The end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.
T.S. Eliot

photo from Cynthia's Polar Adventure

I build dances about the body and its languages. I pursue its eloquence, subtleties and intelligence while investigating the various ways we, as humans, communicate or might communicate. I look for the awkward and unusual to see who lives there, what lives there and what they are saying. My dances twist and grow in obscure ways, with surprising torques and redirections, as if they are trying to trick me.

I strive to not ‘know’ what the dance is about as I am making it, but instead to let movement and images surface from the subconscious, to bubble forth from improvisational states and daydreams. My artistic practice is about getting out of the way, getting lost, wandering. It’s about finding the venue for the subconscious. Much like a tree grows toward light I am striving to follow an organic path that is led by my guts and instincts, not my head and what I think you want to see or hear. But don’t be scared. I’m not interested in pushing your buttons or showing you my dark side. I’m really interested in the whimsical beauty in life, the way we talk and play with our bodies, I want to bring back our five-year-old playfulness and wonder with life.