Become Ocean

Watching dancers at the National Theater, and doing the sum on a lifetime of using my body to go places.

I watched a dancer's sweat fly through the air and hit the floor. I could hear her breathing. That's really becoming ocean, I thought.

Twelve dancers at the National Theatre, rarely in sync. A few drifted together, split, collided on purpose or by accident. Order kept rising out of chaos. Above them, a silver structure rose and sank, throwing light into our eyes.

The sweat came from a duet, the two of them turning in circles. I was in the second row, so I carefully observed their faces as much as their bodies.

Then the lights went dark. The dancers came forward in a line, right up to the audience, and stopped. Completely still. Except they weren't. The dance before it had been so intense, I could see their chests moving and hear them breathing.

Somewhere in that stillness I started crying.

For two years I've been experimenting with what my body can do, and what it likes doing. The question has been getting clearer. Today it was almost sharp. These dancers were conveying something internal, through the body, with no destination and no finish line.

I know a different way of using a body. I cycled from Beijing to Paris. I've tramped, sailed, kayaked white water, skied, orienteered, and ridden mountain bikes down things I probably shouldn't have. My body has always been something that goes somewhere, and I was okay at it.

Watching them, I did the sum. Forty-eight years. What exactly had I been doing?

Well, people say it's a midlife crisis. Or perhaps it's just what happens when you give a question enough time.

Like, I'm a grown-up now, baby.