Dress A Day, Day 48: Spring is Over

Wednesday, June 23

Another dress purchased at Goodwill to play dress-up in. It has lots of bright yellow flowers but a high collar and long skirt that make it perfect for playing the conservative strings of the soul. And I am moving in the direction of conservative and conservation after a Spring of frenzied flight and fabulous fantasy. It is time to get grounded and work. Funny then that after this dance I took three days off this project. Or not funny: practical in the way of conservation. You see my period came, as did a lunar eclipse and a cascade of matters to do with inner work and business work that needed my attending. So I directed my energies where I saw they were needed most. Now I can dance again.

First Break: Tuesday, June 22

Allowed myself a day off. So much is happening. I did post a longer version of the solstice dance on youtube, though, to make up for the missing minutes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpY-Ga0-zLI

Dress A Day, Day 47: Serenading the Solstice

Monday, June 21

Summer Solstice, at the Monday night Open Movement Jam. The lights are low because natural light is still streaming in when I arrive at 8:30PM. I am earlier than usual, it is quiet and there is a mood of reverie and introspection in the room. Good for me, I can dance my sadness and give my prayers for equilibrium a vessel to move into the world through. I love this dress but it always opens in the back. It looks like a big polka dotted red apron that you tie around. Jim, who runs the jam, said it was his favorite dress yet and that it made him think of my shtetl past - did I have a shtetl past, he asks? I do Jim, indeed I do. I come from many kinds of shtetls, ones my father's family may have lived in in past centuries, and ones that live on inside of me and my family. I am making my way out of the shtetl, you who are watching and reading are observing my journey.

Dress A Day, Day 46: A Bed in Boston

Sunday, June 20

This dress is one I am falling in love with. It is actually a skirt, transformed into a dress with a belt. That is how the designer at the recent African Market at BAM convinced me to buy it. It wasn't cheap, but my aunt Esti had put money in my hand to buy a dress with and the designer pointed out how practical it was for travel given that it was two outfits in one, so I let myself buy it. I tried on a few, the prints were so gorgeous, but the two sales women nodded so vigorously when I put the orange one up that I had to take it. Some people still remember me from my Berkeley days as the orange girl, so maybe my past is still with me. I bought it the day after my aunt Esti left and now here I am, at my aunt Esti's house in Boston, at the end of a long day of travel and family visits, exploring the haunted past and looking towards the future.

I want to be good and serious and playful too. I want to be in the light and in my skin and I want to jump and fall and land softly. Amen.

Dress A Day, Day 45: Boundary Building

Saturday, June 19

I bought this dress last year, right around this time, for way too cheap in one of those stores on Fulton St. that makes you remember that sweat shops are still alive and well in the world. But I needed a new dress at that time, one for a special occasion, a Fourth of July party. In fact it was my goodbye party, where I bid farewell to my amazingly gorgeous rooftop garden and the life in the apartment I shared for two and a half years with the ex. On this particular June night independence was on my mind and I meditated on that theme as I biked through dark streets to a party in Bushwick. I didn't bring my camera with me, so it wasn't until I got home that I filmed this dance, but perhaps that gave me time to contemplate the lesson at hand. You see, this year I am learning that independence is not just about freedom, it is about knowing my boundaries and how to guard them. To be free without boundaries is to be open territory for invasion.

Dress A Day, Day 44: Let Loose

Friday, June 18

A break from the lover, a breaking point in my relationship to myself, a break with my past. I'm letting loose with my favorite dancing partner, soul sister and my frequent savior, Diana Quiñonez Rivera at the Leftist Lounge fundraising party in Brooklyn. She is filming for a moment, then she will dance again. I am dancing because I need to, and the dress makes me feel like dancing. It is a dancing dress, made by Deha for dancers, bought at Daffy's sometime in the last two years.

Dress A Day, Day 43: Ancestral Bind

Thursday, June 17

An antique Moroccan dress given to me by my aunt Hana, I think. How personal am I supposed to get on a public blog? Let it be known that I am working through baggage that I do believe has been passed down to me through many generations of bound women. I am face to face with that bind in my relationship to myself, to a lover and to my work. I am pushing up against my limits, sad, tired and yet determined to break free.

Dress A Day, Day 42: Kitchen Couture

Wed, June16

My mother gave me this dress almost two decades ago, a silky french dress with what today might be a super hip cut but one that I could never quite figure out. It's like a house wife's couture costume. And there I am in the kitchen, where I'm spending a lot of time these days thanks to my candida diet, trying to shake off the rage and frustration that is pulsing through me.

Dress A Day, Day 41: Duet at Solo Bar

Tuesday, June 15

I wore this super sexy dress to the not so super sexy Solo Bar on Cortelyou in Brooklyn because I was down to the super sexy dresses and the costume dresses. I bought this one at the Goodwill on Fulton St. and this was my first time wearing it. I often buy dresses thinking: this is a good dress to dance, that is, perform in. But the opportunities to perform are not many these days, so at least it made it on to a short video. My dancing partner is a mean skanker in his late 60's or 70's. Nobody dances at Solo Bar, so this was quite an occasion and he was thrilled to have a partner and I was thrilled to dance with him and at the end of this thrilling night I was completely wiped and the shit hit the fan the next day. I guess I was really stirring things up. That's Audrey Crabtree filming us. She is an amazing performer and a lovely lady.

Dress A Day, Day 40: Mechanical Me

Mon, June 14

Days have passed since I uploaded videos. I am a different person these days, in a different place and that is not a bad thing. By this particular night I was itching to break out of the old me, to break through to new territory. It was coming, the break, it was already happening, in fact. I put on this way too tight dress which I acquired at the clothing swap that took place in my studio in March (www.forceandflow.com, SWAN Flight event). I took it out of obligation to take something and because it fit me, I felt ridiculous holding my breath to zip myself into it, squashing my already not so voluptuous breasts. And maybe this is also a comment on how I felt about the dress dances at this point: they had been going on for so long, and my life had gotten so incredibly busy that the daily (mostly nightly) dances had begun to feel like a mechanical obligation.

Dress A Day, Day 39:

Sunday, June 13

There I was, finished uploading and writing up the past dances, having answered emails, put away laundry and practiced piano, ready to do the next dance. I put on a pretty black dress I had been thinking about yesterday but wasn't feeling up to, started to put the yoga balls away in order to clear the space and boom, the rack fixture came crashing down. Nothing to do but pull the ladder out and start drilling new holes into the wall (sorry neighbors!) Up the ladder with a power tool in a pretty black dress, I knew this was meant to be: I will dance with the drill, a dramatic dance about my glamorous life as a dancer, teacher, businesswoman cum handyman. And I will have fun, must need have fun or why else do this.

The dress comes from Goodwill on Fulton St., a post-breakup purchase, another good reason to roar in it.

Reflections

9:37PM. Just caught up on ten days of dress uploads and have yet to film one tonight. This is the point in the marathon where the questions, Why? and How much longer? keep coming up. Not sure about the latter - maybe two more weeks to go. As for the former, I will share these reasons with you: because I am learning so much about myself and my dance, watching myself dance in my own costumes every day. And maybe, just maybe, if I persevere, I will have a breakthrough and myself and my dance will transform. It's just around the corner...

Dress A Day, Day 38: Darkened Traverse

Saturday, June 12

I was traversing darker territories in my psyche this night. I put on a black dress, handed down to me by my mother or an aunt three or seven years ago, not so sure, and tucked myself under the piano. I am sure I didn't do the dress or myself justice, but I never do when I'm feeling self-conscious. At least I took it for a swing.

Dress A Day, Day 37: Heiroglyphics

Friday, June 11

A woolen Moroccan dress purchased at the Yafo flea market some years ago. I collect beautifully embroidered things, and this one is one of my treasures. I had forgotten about this one when the nights still justified some wool, so I took the Friday night breeze as an opportunity to don it. It reminds me of my Sumerian past lives.

Dress A Day, Day 36: Perch

Thursday, June 10

A fun one, a dress to play in. Got it at Daffy's a year ago on a requisite shopping trip with my mother, who was on a brief visit. Got photographed in it earlier this same day by Michal, an Israeli photographer doing portraits of Israeli artists in Brooklyn. Some days are more fun than others.

Dress A Day, Day 35: Making Faces

Wednesday, June 9

I bought this dress at Goodwill in Santa Barbara when I came from Israel for my brother's graduation, circa 2001. That was a difficult trip, family relations so strained and everyone putting a face on. Maybe being around my family filled me with the desire to be a good girl, the kind that could make it all right: it is a good girl dress, a Banana Republic dress, the kind my Palo Alto high school classmates may have worn but not I. It is a costume, I put it on and all those put on faces come right out.

Dress A Day, Day 34: Witch Dress

Tuesday, June 8

This is one of those dresses I took from my mother's closet back around high school and have worn so rarely. It is sheer and delicate and at 17 I thought it more a costume than an outfit: it was my witch dress. Maybe it still is.

Dress A Day, Day 33: Flock

Monday, June 7

At the jam, late, after most have left, with a dress my aunt Esti bought for me just a week earlier at the African market at BAM. We're flying, Julie and I. It has been all about flying for a few days now, but flying is really so much more fun in a flock.

Dress A Day, Day 32: Flower Power II

Sunday, June 6

I got this dress from my friend and former neighbor, Christina May, just before she moved to San Diego to join a dance company out there whose name I can't recall. The cotton fabric is so thin and soft and wonderful to wear. It's a Sunday dress for sure, one I put on when I want to do a little hiding and relaxing.

Dress A Day, Day 31: Black Bird Lands

Saturday, June 5

The dress is a very simple one left behind by Catherine Hoffmann two summers ago. It's just a little too low cut for me, but flexible so flexible and fun to dance in. I put the gorgeous Japanese silk top over to hide the escaping breasts from the public eye. Then I went to Tompkins park for a free Haitian dance class and performance. Back at the pad it was still so hot, and what with the fan blowing through my hair, the flowing top fluttering like wings the Haitian movements still in my body, I felt like flying. But after two dance classes and a day full of teaching and treating, the dance ended up being about landing.

Dress A Day, Day 30: Land of Loose and Silly

See Monday, May 17 for the story of the purchase of this dress. I regretted this purchase. I never wore the dress, maybe three times... until the day I filmed this video, and suddenly I didn't want to take it off. Go figure. It hangs loosely, the top button keeps unbuttoning itself, the cut is silly really, even more so because of the seriousness of the army fatigue fabric. This was the perfect night to let myself go there, to the land of loose and silly.

Dress A Day, Day 29: Pent Up Desire

Thursday, June 3

I love this dress, it is precious to me. It was given to me by my aunt, who bought it as a vintage dress sometime in the late 70's or early 80's. It is most likely from the 40's or 50's, the kind of dress a nice young lady might wear, full of detail and a cut that reveals just enough of the figure to keep things proper and yet light up curiosity. Did the woman who originally wore this dress ever dance under red lights? There is pent up desire in its seems, I swear it.

Dress A Day, Day 28: Push Pull Kick Play

Wednesday, June 2

Ah, you see, these are long days for me, and this dress has a long history of long days. It's my everything dress, I love to work and play in it, so much more comfortable than wearing pants. It's handmade, vintage no doubt, purchased in Berkeley circa 1996.

What, is it over?

Nope. There are dress dances happening every day, you just don't see them yet (those of you who may be peeking in). I have excuses: today I taught four classes, had two private clients, a three hour rehearsal, at least two hours of office work, and 35 minutes of piano practice. Right now I'm filling the bath with very hot water, and when I get out I'll put on a dress and dance. But you see why it might be difficult after all that to also upload, write up and publish. I will publish all by Sunday, I hope. And I'll have you know that I expect this to last all the way through June, if not longer.

Dress A Day, Day 27: I Dream of Ghana

Tuesday, June 1

This dress came into my possession about an hour before I recorded the dance. My friend Amihay, recently returned from Ghana, brought it for me as a gift: wow. I am dreaming of Africa these days, and not just because of the time spent at the African market at BAM this past weekend. It's calling me, and soon enough I'll answer.

Dress A Day, Day 26: Kouzin or Collapse

Monday, May 31

Music by Monvelyno Alexis, who is invisible in the background, playing DJ while I lie splayed on the floor in this picnic dress. All of a sudden I get up, put the camera in place and start spinning. That's how it happened. The name of the song is Kouzin, which is also the name of a Voodoo spirit. It must have been Kouzin himself who scraped me off the floor, where I lay collapsed and immobile, and sent me whirling through the room.

The dress is one I picked up at the famed costume sale of 2004. I call it my picnic dress because clearly that's where one is supposed to wear this kind of dress, and where I do indeed wear it when a picnic arises. There had been no picnic on this day, but I was as relaxed on my floor as I would have been on the grass, staring up at my thoughts like passing clouds. And all of a sudden I was the wind.

Dress A Day, Day 25: Secret Journey

Sunday, May 30

It's not a mistake, or yes it is, but I'm aware the video is only two seconds long: maybe this was one dance or one day that wasn't meant to be recorded... I'm at the Dance Africa Festival at BAM. Diana is filming, or at least we are under the impression that she is, but the camera chose not to record this particular moment for some reason. This dance came at the end of a long day of roaming and bodywork giving and bead buying. Exhausted, I walked my bike and Diana away from the drum circle and toward the subway stop on Fulton St. On the way, we chanced upon the most sublime of all sights: three master Kora players, joined by my friend Kevin the Mbira player and a flute player, in a parking lot around the corner from the main strip. Now no amount of exhaustion could stop me from appreciating this sight and these sounds, so I took off my sandals and danced barefoot on the warm asphalt. I danced and danced and the more I danced the more the musicians played. People stopped to watch and listen and I danced on as if this was the most natural thing for me to do. At some point I realized that Diana was long gone and the sun was on its way too so I made mine: it was with heavy legs and a light heart that I biked home. The next morning I knew something in my dancing had changed, opened up, transformed, taken flight. Maybe that's why it was out of reach of the camera...

The dress is one I bought in Israel a few years ago with the familiar intention of purchasing something that has no practical value (too short, too tight, too wacky) and which I then proceeded to wear in the coming summers as if it were the little black dress that goes with everything. Funny how that happens.

Dress A Day, Day 24: Come Closer

Saturday, May 29

At the Brooklyn Marriott, late at night, having put my mother and my aunt to bed. I am in one of my favorite dresses: it reminds me of military wear but the cut is so hip and sexy that it camouflages the combat written into it's essence. This night was a night for being hip and sexy and camouflaged: enough said. As close as I may have been, to those who saw me I was far away... and then there were the moments in which I came closer to have a good look.

The dress is one I bought in Belgium, during my residency at the Nadine arts center in 2004. I had been roaming a three square block radius of Brussels for the three weeks of the residency, purchasing little more than groceries and chocolate, so when it was over and I found myself a few blocks further into downtown, I thought it appropriate to buy this dress, which called to me from across the street.

Dress A Day, Day 23: Red Rising

Friday, May 28

There is anger and frustration in the story of the acquisition of this dress. It was bought for me by my mother on one of her visits to New York, early in my stay here. It was a rainy day and I was not particularly happy to find myself in a department store on the Upper East Side. She bought herself a skirt of the same style and color, which eventually ended up in my closet too. I never wore the dress until about a year ago. Even now I wear it rarely, but I don't throw it away. Maybe it reveals a side of me I don't like to see, but with which I must stay in dialogue.

Dress A Day, Day 22: Shake Off the Office

Thursday, May 27

That's my office you see there, and that's me, in a little blue dress, playing grown up late at night (otherwise known as trying to keep up with all the maddening office work required of an independent business woman and artist). Grown ups are overworked, they spend too much time in their heads, on their butts, in front of computers. They need to shake it off. This dress makes me feel young enough to do just that: get up and shake and roll and slam the computer shut. I bought it in London, picked it out of a pile of second hand clothes at the Curry Lane market. It's the only dress I bought in London, where I was far more of a serious grown up than I am these days and free days for roaming and buying pretty things were so very rare.

Dress A Day, Day 21: Peel and Serve

Wednesday, May 26

Sometimes a girl just needs to dance. And dance, and dance again. I did four takes of this dress dance, determined to peel off the layers that were covering the essence of this woman in this dress. Earlier in the day, I flew through Brooklyn on my bike in it, the wind peeling the dress from my thighs and revealing bare skin to the world. I was not shy or flattered or upset by the stares and shouts, maybe I was baring my legs to the world in place of a public speech to proclaim my growing strength. But nightfall in the studio revealed my vulnerability, and a sense of doubt and dissatisfaction played itself out as I kept going back to record another round of dance (see two more takes on my youtube channel).

Don't remember exactly where I got this one: was it Israel or San Francisco? Wore it rarely, but always with Pina Bausch's Nelken on my mind. Rediscovered it in Israel just this past January, in a bag that had traveled from Tel Aviv to Haifa to Sderot to Tel Aviv again over the course of six years while it waited to reunite with me. I fell in love with it again, or maybe for the first time, and so I have my aunts to thank for safekeeping it all these years.

Dress A Day, Day 20: Guide

Tuesday, May 25

Epic journeys always involve elf-like creatures that guide the protagonist from one world to the next, don't they?

A Himalayan sweater dress purchased at the Yafo flea market in Israel to be worn in the Catskills, where I lived and worked at the time with an experimental theater company. Elves seem rather bland compared to some of the characters I encountered up there.

Dress A Day, Day 19: Graduation Ceremony

Monday, May 24

At the jam, in a quiet back room with a big sign on the door: Theater Department. Today is my anniversary: it was this Monday in May last year that I packed my things and moved into my new life. But more than an anniversary, a graduation! I am bigger now, I feel it today, more ready to play than ever.

The dress is from Berkeley, a second hand purchase from Telegraph Ave. bought in my freshman year when I was meticulous about wearing at least a little bit of orange every day. It's hand made and was once a lot longer, I imagine, but not in my time. The fabric is a horrible polyester which is fine for Berkeley where the days are mostly pleasant, but not for the sweat pit that is Tel Aviv. I wore it so much in college that I couldn't part with it when I moved to Israel, so it sat in storage for almost four years until my mother announced that it was her turn to move to Israel and I, recently arrived to New York, trekked to California to sort through the few boxes I left behind. While away, my Brooklyn apartment was broken into for the second time in the two short months I had lived there and maybe that's a different story except that it's part of what I've graduated from: that time in my life in which my private space was broken into and burglarized repeatedly. Amen.