Pilcrow

New fake-leather jacket with detachable hood—I've been saying, for a couple years now really, that I ought to have some kind of heavy jacket that I can wear during the colder months when it's sunny, or at least not really raining, so that I don't always have to wear my long heavy raincoat. I like that raincoat (it's a London Fog coat), but it does feel odd now to wear it out when it's sunny outside. Now I've got a cool new jacket that makes me smile when I wear it.

More work coming—I talked to one of my clients today and he's got a bunch of things coming up, very likely including at least another pass on the long guide document I worked on last month that gave me a good amount of billable hours, and also including non-Microsoft work. I'm in contact with someone else who may become a new source of work, and even if that doesn't pan out it's proving to be a learning experience already. And of course I've got some work to do for KEXP in March following the Spring Membership Drive that starts next Friday.

Dancing and concerts—I'm going out to the Baltic Room tomorrow night for the dance night TRUST, which features KEXP DJ Kid Hops and local DJ group Sun Tzu Sound. Next week I'm going to see Man or Astro-Man? at the Crocodile on Thursday, which should be amazing, and then Hotels (celebrating the release of their new CD, On the Casino Floor) at the Columbia City Theatre on Saturday. Also coming up are a bunch of good shows, including Asobi Seksu, Pogo, Dodos, and Foals, plus Sarah Vowell doing readings from her latest book.

My primary reason to go out dancing is to have fun dancing. I enjoy the music and I enjoy moving to it.

As I said in the previous post, I'm not an extrovert. I don't like approaching strangers and trying to strike up a conversation, unless I have a really good obvious reason to talk to someone. I know that and I'm nominally okay with that, it's just how I am. So although I recognize that it'd be good to meet more people and therefore that is a secondary reason why I've been going out dancing, I don't go out with any determination that I have to meet someone. I'm not pressuring myself to approach people, I don't feel guilty about not making more direct effort to meet people.

I don't expect to meet people. I don't expect strangers to talk to me—and I'm always surprised when they do. 

Dancing can be interactive, and I do hope when I'm dancing near some attractive woman that she might take notice of me and dance with me. But I rarely know whether someone wants to dance with me; a simple friendly smile is just that, it's not necessarily any kind of invitation for more interaction, so the woman has to really obviously take the initiative or else I'll just keep dancing on my own, maybe sort of playing up to her but making no overt moves. And I don't really know how to dance with someone, either, so the few times someone has looked me straight in the eye and started dancing in my direction, I've almost always been at a loss for what to do. (I did do fine last year dancing with someone I met while out at a show, but in that case she'd initiated conversation first and it was clear she wanted my attention.)

Though I may be hopeful that I'll get to dance with someone and though sometimes I do get some interaction, I never expect that that's going to lead to conversation, let alone anything like exchanging phone numbers or taking someone home with me.

So, if I go out dancing with so little expectation of anything but having fun dancing on my own, why is it that shortly after the evening's done and I'm headed home, I fall into a funk of dejection? Why am I cranky and unhappy? Why do I feel my loneliness so keenly? Why does this seem to be becoming a part of the experience of going out dancing?

I'm really looking forward to Decibel Festival this week. I've been looking forward to it for months. But I'm concerned that I'm going to have this dejection hitting me each night, and that I'm really not going to enjoy the event after all.

*Note: I did not actually come home and cry and want to die. But those lines are just too apt for me to not reference the song. Also, writing this out has the usual effect of making me feel somewhat better—I'm not sure if it's self-deprecation as such, but I do tend to start feeling amused by my pathos, I just can't take it seriously for long. Still, I do feel dejected and lonely and it does suck. So tired of it.

In the 40 T/D/Y series, I wrote about how I used to like going out dancing at the local goth club in Boston, and for over a year went regularly once a month. After moving to Seattle, I wanted to get some friends together and continue to go out dancing regularly, but that never happened. Some of my new friends were interested in going out dancing, and some of my new friends were members of a local private goth club The Mercury (though none of them really bothered to go anymore), but everyone was kind of noncommittal about making plans and I never pushed hard enough to make it happen.

Last September I covered the Decibel Festival for KEXP, and had a blast going out to the clubs over the weekend, hearing great music and doing a lot of dancing. I enjoyed the showcase put on by local DJ/promo crew Sweatbox, so I started keeping an eye out for their events. But it wasn't until this past April, when they had their two-year anniversary party at Electric Tea Garden, that I finally went to one of them. Once again I had a great time, and so I've been going to their monthly events at ETG since. 

Things that I've liked about these events:

• Dancing is fun.
• It's additional exercise that I wouldn't normally be getting.
• it's an opportunity to meet new people and hopefully develop some new friendships or find romance.
• I actually have been meeting new people and making new connections.
• The Electric Tea Garden is a decent venue with cool friendly staff.

Things I haven't liked so much:

• Although it's not too hard to meet new people—helped by the fact that I already knew a couple people connected with the scene—it's not really a place for extended conversation, so it's a hard and slow process to develop any connections beyond just recognizing and knowing people in passing. Furthermore...
• Since it's a monthly event, I'm not seeing any of these people very often, and there's no particular guarantee they'll be there each month, making opportunities to develop connections even more difficult.
• Because these are afterhours events—starting at 10 pm, yes, but running until 5 am—hardly anyone even shows up before 2 am, when the bars all close, and most people clear out by 3:30 am. 
• The notably higher proportion of men to women.

Things that puzzle me. I understand of course that this is a social scene—after all, I'm hoping to make new friends myself—and that people aren't just there solely to dance, they come to see their friends and maybe just to be seen. Still, I'm puzzled by:

• The people who show up dressed to the nines, only to stand around on the floor talking for a bit, maybe shuffle around a bit, and then leave.
• The people (more women than men, that I've observed) who spend five minutes out on the floor doing some amazing dancing and then disappear for an hour. 
• The people (more men than women doing this) who come out on the dance floor in a cluster and stand around talking instead of dancing, being in the way of everyone else. (There was a particularly egregious instance of this at the May event, when this dude just stood right near the front staring at the DJ while his girlfriend and the rest of us were dancing, but at least he didn't have a crowd of four or five other dudes standing there with him.)

Last night's event was the least-attended of the four I've been to so far, and none of the people I've met (or knew beforehand) were there, so although I still enjoyed myself dancing, it just didn't feel as much fun as the previous events. It was disconcerting to show up last night at 12:45 am to find maybe a half-dozen people there, and to be the only one dancing much of the time for most of the next hour. Still, I plan to keep going whenever I can; it's not that different from going out to concerts by myself, and better in that since it's specifically a dance event, I've got something to do right from the start instead of standing around alone, awkwardly waiting for the show to begin.

"Swing Set" by Jurassic 5

As I mentioned in my previous post, I was convinced (or "suckered" as she says) by my friend Dawn to try out swing dancing lessons, and I signed up for a five-week beginner course that started last night. The classes are put on by HepCat Productions and are currently held at the Russian Community Center on Capitol Hill (in the area of that little neighborhood center around 19th Ave and Aloha Street). The class is an hour long, and then from 9 to midnight they host an open dance ($5 at the door, or free for current students). Both the class and the open dancing seemed to have a decent range of people from college-age to maybe low 40s, with a few people even older at the open dancing.

Swing dancing is a workout, it turns out. Just the basic footwork that we learned in the first lesson is enough to work up a sweat. This is good as I don't do enough exercise. The dancing is tricky in that I have to think about what I'm doing in order to learn the steps, but then I promptly have to forget about what I'm doing - internalize it - or else I'll trip all over myself. Despite having years of practice in martial arts training, I still kept catching myself watching my feet, which was certain to throw me off. This class happens to have more people taking the lead position than the follower position, and I almost crossed over to the follower side, but as a guy I'll normally be expected to be a lead and I figured I'd better learn that position first. At the moment I'm so uncertain of what I'm doing that I'm very hesitant and no good as a lead, but I'm hoping that hesitancy will go away as I become familiar with the moves.

The post-lesson open dancing had its own problems for me. First, it seemed like everyone, including people who claimed to be complete beginners like myself, knew a lot more than I did or at least were more confident about it. Second, what we're learning in class is the Lindy Hop, which the instructor describes as the fundaments of swing dancing. However, several people I danced with wanted to do East Coast Swing, which is actually a simpler basic step but it's a three-beat (or six-count) step rather than the four-beat/eight-count Lindy Hop, adding to my confusion. (This also came up a couple weeks ago when I first tried the swing dancing, and for some reason I couldn't get Dawn to understand that some people were trying to dance in three beats and some in four, and I couldn't tell which I was supposed to be doing.) Third, I mostly wanted to focus on staying on time and in step with my partner and get the basic steps internalized, but that doesn't make for fun dancing and I sometimes felt like I was being a drag. Finally, I simply don't relax easily. I tend to hold myself stiffly when trying to learn some physical activity, a problem that's come up as far back as violin lessons, as well as in my martial arts training. I've also always been hesitant to get close to strangers (particularly women), feeling I should keep a polite/safe distance, which also makes me stiff and hesitant and leads to awkwardness when dancing.

Despite all that, I did have fun in the open dancing. Some of the women were merely tolerant of my awkward self, but others (besides Dawn) were kind and direct about telling me to loosen up and helping me try new steps. I had a good time in particular with one woman who was also in the beginner class and, although she too seemed a little more comfortable and familiar with the moves than I am, seemed to be at about my level of competency, which was much less intimidating. Still, I feel like I somehow have to let go and loosen up quickly or the dancing will become unbearably awkward and not fun.

So, overall it's definitely fun and a good thing to learn and do, and I'm hopeful that I'll enjoy the class and the dancing enough to continue on once this one's over. I'm already a little disappointed that I may miss the final class, because there's supposed to be a KEXP Volunteer Appreciation Party the same night and I don't want to miss that either. I suppose I might be able to go to the lesson and then late to the party after, as it involves bands playing at a club somewhere and the lesson's only from 8 to 9.

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On another matter, I also mentioned in the previous post that Nimiel was showing signs of the distress she's had before. Cleaning out the litterbox did seem to immediately reduce the frequency of her trips, but she persisted in the behavior for a few days, leaving me guessing whether I needed to call the vet or not. Since Wednesday though she seems back to normal, so I think she's okay. I wish I knew for sure whether it was some kind of quick-passing (no pun intended) illness, or some reaction to her litter. I had used a different brand of the silicon crystals litter, with bigger crystals, the last time I changed it because the store was out of the brand I usually use, but I don't think that kind stayed effective as long as the usual brand, so that might've had something to do with it. Next time the store's out of the usual brand, I'll pick up another brand that has similar-sized crystals and see how that works.