Gratitude Overwhelm

This morning, I started drifting awake thinking about all the shots we maybe 'should have taken' and didn't yesterday during my dance company Rhythmically Speaking's first-ever (and outside in MN January, mid-pandemic, 11 hour) screendance shoot. It shook me awake, starting to dream up shots I probably wouldn't have before being there, in the moment, with all the dancers and the videography team. I can't help but start post-morteming before a project is over: I just don't want to miss any chance to learn something and take note of it for an even better next time.

While I haven't seen the footage yet, I am CERTAIN it will be beautiful and more than enough to make a beautiful screendance. Knowing this does not stop me from thinking through 'woulda-shoulda-coulda's, but as long as I can keep these thought processes in the territory of 'learn from' rather than 'torture thyself,' I think they can be productive!

So how does this connect to gratitude? Pretty easily, actually. Worries about missed shots shook me awake, but very shortly after getting myself out on my morning walk - back into nature without an agenda - I started to feel the gratitude collecting within me. Looking at the trees in my neighborhood, I was shook by how incredibly fortunate we were to have such a beautiful and rare natural event - rime ice - happening on the very shoot date we'd set months head. Earlier this week, I was lamenting the forecast, thinking about how we wouldn't be able to capture a beautiful sunrise or a beautiful sunset - many of which we've seen happen while rehearsing out at the beautiful land at which we were so fortunate (there's that word again) to practice and shoot.

I got over that lament pretty quick when realizing the trees were going to be just coated in soft yet prickly snow-ice that . . . I just can't describe the beauty of this. Wow. The best I can do for a visual right now is a screen-shot of a video I grabbed at rehearsal on Friday:

Beautiful in it's own right, but unable to capture the magic of yesterday. 

I was so absorbed in simultaneously managing my producer, director, choreographer and dancer roles that I didn't capture anything! I know Kris got some shots, but he too was balancing too many jobs - the slate, the music, keeping us on time, carrying equipment - to really get much of anything to document the ABSOLUTE SPLENDOR of nature that we were so fortunate to get to make art amidst yesterday. I really don't think anything could have. The footage we captured for the screendance will have it's own magic, just like the experience as a whole, itself, has it's own. 

So, WOW. GRATITUDE. After my heart and head could process the gratitude surrounding the nature of yesterday's art-making experience, it drifted to the people. WOW, the people. I told Kris yesterday that I'm not sure how I got lucky enough to work with such talented, kind-spirited, funny, focused, TOTALLY BRILLIANT humans. From the dancers to the film folks to my ever-adaptable, willing, supportive and capable dude Kris, trying to write this sentence of gratitude has me sitting here, alone on my couch at 9:30am on the Sunday following such a crucial, long yet quick and thick day, sobbing. Just sobbing. Soundtrack of John Prine's last release "I Remember Everything." Just sobbing. I'll remember everything. At least I'll really try to.

I'd like to think that 'how I got so lucky' - really, fortunate - to get to work with such incredible folks on the regular has something to do with the work I put into being a kind, joyful and supportive person willing to dream kinda neat art dreams :)  Whatever unique circumstances and chemistry (and ok, HARD WORK) brought yesterday together, it was quite the recipe.

My heart-swell really cannot be captured in words (or visuals!) here, but I tried, and it's helping me process it all to be able to move on to other items that are calling my name. WOW. I feel how I feel after closing a show: an overwhelming sense of gratitude, a particular and familiar feeling both striking and comforting. It's weird to experience this feeling knowing there is still so much work to do (i.e. editing, color correcting, release), but I suppose the day after show-close, there is always still quite a bit of work to do (wrapping up the budget, post-mortem meetings, etc.). All the same . . . these feelings are sure to buoy me for a while, and I'll be sure to hold them dear, preserve them and check in on them when I need them.

WOW.

Gratitude overwhelm.