Sexy Dancing, Disco Hair and the Kind Culture Gods...

Saturday morning. Saturday morning goes. Sunday morning. Sunday morning goes. Monday morning...

... Think I missed that one completely.

Distracting times indeed. I spent the entire bank holiday running around like an idiot preparing for nothing in particular. Now it's Wednesday night and here I am with about six LIDL chocolate bars in my belly and a sense of rising disappointment in my personal dilapidation. Ah, never mind. May as well finish the pack, guilt is guilt after all, no matter how big or small.

I was warned, last week, not to neglect the novel in favour of boys, and have done exactly that. Now I'm at the point of blogging about it, just to avoid facing the damn thing. What's stopping me? I long to sit down, undistracted and undisturbed. Heck, I even thought about pulling a sicky today, just to be alone with my thoughts and some silly words.... but I've never pulled a sicky and would totally fuck that up.

No, instead, I've been enjoying a rare lull in my team's workload, so that suddenly I have lifted my head and noticed I'm working in a radio station again. Last week was pretty much like living in an advert for all the cake, disco hair and inappropriate touching that goes on in the place. It's so funny how a few people can make the difference. A few new faces can break down the barriers for a little while, and a few old faces can suddenly become much more open.

I seem to have had a lot of 'how was the date's this end of the week, which made me realise just how much I was banging on about seeing that little dreamboat of a man on Friday night. Oops. But hey, at least I can say it went well.

Not the novel though. The novel seems destined to remain handwritten and illegible as a testament to my laziness.

In a haze of possibly the WORST PMT emotions to date (if you're a man / fortunate woman, imagine you woke up to discover everythign in the world was absolultely awful and endless and boring and you were very sad and didn't like anything or anyone, for about three whole days in a row), I winched myself into the back of a colleague's car for a wedding last Thursday night and proceeded to hit the dancefloor to the strains of Lionel Richie and Wham! (again, reference the radio station I work for and therein lies the appeal)

This was all well and good. We flung our arms out dramatically, improvised clever mimes, mimicked each others movements in a heartwarming display of cordiality and just generally looked like utter tits together. It was only when the hotter stuff started playing that a creeping selfconsciousness arrived (albeit waaaaaay too late) Suddenly we were stranded. A group of perspiring women, late twenties / early thirties / early forties, frozen for a moment by the strains of Rita Ora and Rihanna. To be fair, I think the others got their groove pretty quickly, but in my pre-menstrual state of trauma I was left to ask the question which must have struck us all at some point:

How the hell do you dance to this?

And then the other question.
This question is pretty new to me.

Am I too old for this?

I searched for someone young and cool to stand near, but instantly was confronted by a colleague side-walking like a crab on hot coals across my line of vision. God, she had moves. That was the stuff of signatures. Near me, the others had adjusted their style to shed the slingbacks and were desperately reaching and posing in the hope that they might resummon Katrina and the Waves. Miserably, I wriggled my frame in best porno style to the beat, feeling obscene, but smiling so that only I knew it.

This was how my one usual dancefloor preoccupation became two.

My usual concern is only that if I am enjoying myself, it's always pretty singular. I can never be stuffed with the whole posing and grinning at friends. I'm here to move. You are too. Great. Just let's not get in each other's way. This is probably why netball was never my forte. Or any sort of games lesson to be fair.

My next thought was this: If everyone loves cheesy music because they love a silly dance.... or if everyone loves a grind to Pitbull because they're flaunting their body to someone... perhaps the large part and purpose of dancing has always been ironic movement?

Please hear me out before you consign me to the scrapheap for pompus drivel. From what Saturday night televsion tells me all winter long, it seems that more formal dances have a grace, a structure, and a rule. This dispalys the form at it's finest, exploits assets, nutures and inspires art and humility of expression..... and is a gentle reminder of our inner civility.

The wedding disco, however, seeks to destroy this. When the first dance is done and the poor groom can finally get on with enjoying married life unharmed, doesn't everybody hit the floor for a bit a of a smootchy (to be fair, last time I did this was with a lesbian) number that very quickly gets rowdy?

There's nothing more fun or liberating than rejecting what feels like form in favour of a good old laugh at oneself, and each other. I would argue the same for those filthy nightclub scenarios - all bump and sweat and tongues. Essentially it's breaking a barrier of physciality that casual conversation woudln't permit, and traditional dance would never allow.

So we all throw the scores through the window until something comes on that we know NOTHING about.

I'm talking about you, Pitbull.

I have no idea how to dance to your music. Do I jump? What looks sexy? Can I lift my arms up? What about feet? And the bum, the BUM, for Pete's sake.

Anyway, the long and short of it is, inhibition kills improvised dance, but even disinhibition takes quite some stoical practise. I don't think I'm in danger of seducing anyone soon with a cleverly timed squat, but at least I can be silly - REALLY silly - to a bit of Wham! And that stuff comes naturally.

Speaking of which, I cannot say I've enjoyed Talk Talk's 'It's My Life' quite so much as when I was doing my hand washing the other night and it came pumping through my headphones.....

INTERVAL. WRITER RANDOMLY AND DARINGLY FALLS ASLEEP ON SOFA. LIDL CHOCOLATE BISCUIT COMA COMPLETE.

10 MINUTES LATER, WRITER AWAKES PLEASANTLY

... Sorry Talk Talk. But it's my life indeed, and I adored the liberation of dancing to your tune in huge irony, performing my chores, as did the many pairs of knickers I was drowning in Bold.

The entertainment gods have been kind to me, bringing my favourite movie (Hitchcock's Notorious) and my favourite band (the temporarily reformed Grandaddy) to the silver screen and stage here in London, respectively in one week. I feel like I'm reconvening with the very stuff that formed me as a person. Very self-absorbed I know, but by gosh I thought it was something worth mentioning. How exciting to share it all again, as if brand new - a movie and music I thought I had discovered alone one day, now a spectacle, glorious, shared and passionate once again.

Such is the binding power of communal, arranged entertainments. Whether it's dancing, movies, music or just a plain old disco fancy dress day in the office - there is a shared language, a shared culture, a shared warmth. I was attempting to spell the word(s) nun-chucks to impress the boy with such a cult reference the other night (Napoleon Dynamite of course), when I went slinking to my Collins Gem dictionary like the pedant I am.

No such luck with my niche oriental weapon. I did, however discover the words 'nymphomania', 'nubile' and 'nudist' in close proximity.

No idea why those words popped out at me. Only I think I ought to be sharing a little less of that sort of culture and engaging a little more of the unshared if this novel is ever going to get anywhere.

The Flowers don't stop growing. The Earth doesn't stop turning. And I can't stop drinking.

Well, it's been a while, but I've still have a few pressing matters to discuss with you. What's more, I can remember what some of those are, so this may be a big one...

Life has got in the way of my antisocial musings of late, due to birthdays (mine) and a sort of blanket social mania brought on by a couple of warm, summer days (everyone else's). In fact, it's been so busy, I've been going to bed late at night, having drunkenly scoured Facebook, and woken up early enough for nothing in particular to have changed on that social networking site. That's right. I am socialising in line with the rest of the world, how NOVEL!

Speaking of which, my poor novel meanwhile languishes in neglect. Written elaborately by hand across 7 books of lined paper, desperate for some re-writing and typing up into some sort of legible format - it is my soul's project, my reckoning, and ultimately less attractive a pursuit than getting drunk in cocktail bars with sexy boys.

But hey, that's what winter's for isn't it? Summer is for revelling in the outdoors and not being at home. I'm now the proud parader of a pretty little garden - shared with the 4 other flats in this big victorian house and yet used by only me, and last Sunday's party guests. I'm sitting in it now, amongst a bee-hassled lavender. My favourite part of every morning is drawing back the curtains to look outside at which flowers have burst into bloom, the tidiness of my lawn (I should give my sister her flymo back but I LOVE it) and the sweet little bird table in the middle. Here's a picture of something that appeared in just 24 hours of sunshine yesterday...

I've worked hard on this garden and it's paid off. Yes, this is what makes me happy, aged 27, and what's more I'm not particularly embarrassed by it. 

Having said that, I have experienced some acute adolescent-style embarrassment this week, as I tumble all over the place as this sleep-deprived super-social wreck. Last night it was up a North London escalator (sober and no, nobody helped me. It's NORTH London) Additionally, I'm dating a spectacularly clever and sexy man who took me for dinner one night, where I discovered I had forgotten how to eat, drink and hold a conversation in any kind of tidy pattern. Luckily, there was wine, and this has been the great enabler in ensuring I do not stop mid-conversation just to look at him and think, 'whuh?'. Which I have been doing. It's nice to be inhibited again. But what I've realised is that I'm not the only one. 

When he told me he was nervous, I realised how much of my dating style is basically 'waffle around and make them laugh, but essentially wait for them to take the lead'. This is both a little pathetic on my part, and made me realise that I'd just assumed the guy always knows what he's doing. Especially when he's that hot. But then I think this applies to many we consider our better. Whether they're more attractive, smart, rich, older or perhaps... more masculine, which is worrying. I know my automatic reaction, when someone has the upper hand, is to assume the have infinite knowledge and confidence. 

I've greatly enjoyed the Olympic fever and rampant heroism attributed to British athletes in the past few weeks. We've come together, lived and revelled in the unifying influence of these games upon us. We are all equals in this. None of us understand what the rules of handball are, and we are in it together, just watching and not understanding... passionately. On the other hand of course, are the heroes. So inspiring that there genuinely is no need to concern yourself with being super-human, for Jess Ennis and the lot have it covered. I've particularly enjoyed the bus stop posters plastered around London, advertising Adidas sportswear and displaying our champions in ripped, gracious triumph. As a runner on the streets of London I've basically been pretending each is a mirror as I pass. It makes me run a little faster, honestly. 

My other recent London travel experiment has been cycling. As I have previously noted I don't have the coordination for (INSERT ANYTHING) and as a result have been using the pavements between Sydenham and Grove Park in attempts to avoid the bus and still visit my sister. Nobody seems to mind much, although the guilt of this calculated law-breaking is quite palpable. I'm constantly surprised by the Sydenham pedestrian's willingness to smile and get out of my way. It's their right of way, I shouldn't be cycling there, but hey, the sun's shining. The finest moment, however, was when I scooted past the heavy traffic up Chinbrook Road and passed a police car. Oh the thrill, the tension of such flagrant law-breaking! Is this really how I get my kicks? Yes, yes it is. There was no hot pursuit, no strongly-worded reprimand. They didn't even batt an eyelid. I will do it again. And I will wear a helmet, because... safety first and all that.

But back to the Olympians one more time and briefly, as I don't want to add the mulch of empty personal opinions on this national event when there is plenty of intelligent commentary out there. What gets me most about being so inspired is firstly that you are actually surprised to be inspired. I for one really didn't expect to be genuinely moved by any of this business, and yet for the first time in a few months I've actually been bothered to do press-ups, run fast and genuinely look after myself in a structured way. Such is the influence of positive role models. I guess it really does work. I guess it also helps that I'm trying to get laid, and one must be in shape for such things, by the way. But what struck me as most significant about all these inspired people I meet, is that suddenly, after all this anticipation, they own their own futures. 2012 spent a long time coming, and it's here now. Just as the 80s was the 80s back then and now it's a reminiscence weekend on my radio station. I'm struggling to find a way of expressing that feeling again, that the future is now, right now for the taking, and you shouldn't faff about waiting to live it. I think big events make everyone question that, don't they? Everyone feels like they've got an opportunity to be a piece of history, or a line in a textbook when something big happens, and they want to have a story or a memory, or something special to mark it to themselves, and to make their own mark. There's an anxiety behind it - don't forget me, don't leave me behind here. Let me be a part of it.

And yet for the most part it is easy to be distracted, misdirected, or unfulfilled, for London 2012 was made for us, not by us. We all need a sense of purpose, a project - be that a person, an object, something creative, or something practical, and we need to believe in it. We've all got to make our mark.

So if future is now, what on earth are we to do with it?