Questions from @jesse-the-k
Dec. 8th, 2024 01:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
soniaThanks for the fun questions, jesse_the_k! If anyone else wants questions, let me know. And of course you're welcome to answer any of these, too.
How did you learn to ride a bike? Where did you go?
I learned to ride a bike late. The details have blurred with time, but I think I learned at my cousins' house during a rare holiday visit when I was 10 or so, borrowing one of their smaller bikes. I remember for sure that I fell and hit my knee on concrete, and the bruise hurt for *months*.
I didn't get my own bike until I was 12 years old, because we didn't move to a place where my parents deemed it safe to ride until I was 10, and then it wasn't a priority for them. I really WANTED a bike, though. I could only ride around our subdivision, because the only ways out were on narrow, dangerous roads. This is why I don't live in the suburbs!
Why the West Coast?
Short answer: because I fell in love with it. Longer answer: I applied to UC Berkeley for grad school, visited a college friend out here and got a big YES, WANT feeling. Opening the UC Berkeley acceptance letter was one of the most uncomplicatedly happy moments of my life. Didn't hurt that it's 3,000 miles away from my parents.
What was the first dance you remember learning?
The first dance I danced in the circle rather than behind the line was a Romanian dance Alunelul, "the hazelnut," when I was 8 years old. Which was an odd choice because we did it in shoulder hold. The adults kindly reached down to my small shoulders. Here I am doing it at the 2024 Hoolyeh dance party, second in line. A smaller group is doing it in shoulder hold in the middle of the circle. And here's the "right" version of the music, the recording I grew up with by the Oranim Zabar Troupe from Israel.
If the food fairy decided to visit right now, what would they leave in your refrigerator?
Gosh. I just went to the farmers' market this morning and Berkeley Bowl yesterday, so I'm pretty well supplied. Let's say some kind of delicious fruit juice that has healing properties.
If you could have a truly scent- and virus-free office, would you prefer to work in person or from home?
Home, definitely. Open offices are hard for me to tolerate, much less concentrate in, and if I'm going to be in an office by myself, I'd rather be home with my cat and a very short commute up the stairs.
jesse_the_k! If anyone else wants questions, let me know. And of course you're welcome to answer any of these, too.How did you learn to ride a bike? Where did you go?
I learned to ride a bike late. The details have blurred with time, but I think I learned at my cousins' house during a rare holiday visit when I was 10 or so, borrowing one of their smaller bikes. I remember for sure that I fell and hit my knee on concrete, and the bruise hurt for *months*.
I didn't get my own bike until I was 12 years old, because we didn't move to a place where my parents deemed it safe to ride until I was 10, and then it wasn't a priority for them. I really WANTED a bike, though. I could only ride around our subdivision, because the only ways out were on narrow, dangerous roads. This is why I don't live in the suburbs!
Why the West Coast?
Short answer: because I fell in love with it. Longer answer: I applied to UC Berkeley for grad school, visited a college friend out here and got a big YES, WANT feeling. Opening the UC Berkeley acceptance letter was one of the most uncomplicatedly happy moments of my life. Didn't hurt that it's 3,000 miles away from my parents.
What was the first dance you remember learning?
The first dance I danced in the circle rather than behind the line was a Romanian dance Alunelul, "the hazelnut," when I was 8 years old. Which was an odd choice because we did it in shoulder hold. The adults kindly reached down to my small shoulders. Here I am doing it at the 2024 Hoolyeh dance party, second in line. A smaller group is doing it in shoulder hold in the middle of the circle. And here's the "right" version of the music, the recording I grew up with by the Oranim Zabar Troupe from Israel.
If the food fairy decided to visit right now, what would they leave in your refrigerator?
Gosh. I just went to the farmers' market this morning and Berkeley Bowl yesterday, so I'm pretty well supplied. Let's say some kind of delicious fruit juice that has healing properties.
If you could have a truly scent- and virus-free office, would you prefer to work in person or from home?
Home, definitely. Open offices are hard for me to tolerate, much less concentrate in, and if I'm going to be in an office by myself, I'd rather be home with my cat and a very short commute up the stairs.
Thanks for more insight
Date: 2024-12-11 04:37 pm (UTC)into your rich life.
I was so lucky neighborhood kids taught me how to ride in 1st grade, when I lived in DC -- the freedom! the freedom! Not that early 60s DC was a great place to cycle -- mostly I rode around enclosed parking lots on the block -- but just the possibility lightened my heart. Back in Cambridge I got a lovely green 24" wheel Raleigh step-through with SA hub (It may have been a Space Rider) and I rode that everywhere until I left home. I had an epic fall on my way to 3rd grade, and my road-rashy foot took months to heal. When we ended up in NJ suburbia in 6th grade, I was confident enough to ride to school on a two-lane high-crown road.
in re West Coast: at least a thousand miles away from family-of-origin is a great place for those of us with difficult childhoods.
Thanks for the dance video! I love seeing how lightly you step, and also that dance is an excellent example of one step forward, two steps back. The circle seems to rotate around 4 degrees by the end.
Oh the Berkeley Bowl is a succulent resource: you know you're in California when there are six kinds of avocado on offer.
I hope you have the best possible working environment!
Re: Thanks for more insight
Date: 2024-12-13 05:14 am (UTC)A dance teacher from Bulgaria did say that the back-and-forthness of folk dances is a statement about life. I had never thought of it that way before she said it.
There's an interesting thing about muscle memory. Older folk dancers who mostly dance with smaller steps and less energy, revert to their youthful energy levels when they do a favorite dance from when they were young. Not sure how much I've slowed down so far...