Is NOTHING sacred? What about nothingness, as in no-thought? It's great.

I have a gym membership. In December, the Zumba teacher broke her ankle and they needed a replacement. They substituted street dance, hip-hop style. Today was my first class, however I met and chatted with the instructor in Dec. after joining in the last ten minutes of his class.

"Have you danced before?" he shouted over the music after I picked up the combination after five minutes.

"Used to!" I replied.

Later,  I told him I haven't danced seriously for about 20 years, but I've got about 12 years of ballet, another year of modern and scattered classes of jazz, indian, and african in my history. I nearly joined the performing company at The Dance Place in DC, but I moved away before I was invited to audition. (Carla, the owner, told me that she would have invited me if only I wasn't moving...)

Today after class, (and he's a pro teacher and enters competitive hip hop dance events) he was saying how hard it is to get the girls who've been trained in ballet to actually loosen up. When they try to do hip hop they are stiff as a board, just like their ballet or jazz teacher molded them to be.

"It's difficult to unlearn conformity," I added, because it took me several years to stop pointing my toes when I lifted my feet from the floor. It took me years after quitting ballet to be able to shake my hips!

So that's a great allegory for how people get attached to the methods and  tools they use for coping. High school is all about blending in, right? Structured education teaches children to answer as they think they should, not as they really want to. But, we've all got to learn to conform as we're growing up, then to be able to lose the conformity when it's time to take charge of our own lives.

Three year old boy: "I trying to kill the fish. I made a mess upstairs."
Mommy: "You what? You tried to kill the fish?"
Three year old boy: "Yes. I made a mess."

Mommy runs upstairs. There is a hole in the fish bowl and half the water has drained out. The fish is alive. Phew. There is water on the floor and broken glass in the sink. Mommy goes downstairs, and the boy has not moved from the couch.

Mommy: "You broke the fishbowl."
Three year old boy: "I not break fishbowl with mirror. No."

This just cracks me up. Of course, I told him, "Don't try to kill the fish again. I love the fish." It's a betta and we keep a small hand mirror by the fishbowl to get him to puff up.

But the lying is just intrinsic to my kids. First he admits out of the clear blue. Then he tries to cover it up!