random thoughts – Day 1,768 – (Saturday) – dance and rain

Today’s treat was attending a belly dance workshop in Cambridge. In the mode of everything is always on the same day, it meant missing the birthday cake at LaLa Books in celebration of Edgar Allen Poe’s birthday and two art exhibit receptions.

Fuzzy sun in a gray sky.

The morning was spent drinking Finnish coffee that has been reserved exclusively for weekends followed by hanging around the house waiting for it to be time to leave. While the coffee was brewing, the sky was turning pink with the sunrise. Later, the clouds moved in, and the sun was a fuzzy white cotton ball hung in a gray sky.

The dance bag was packed with my yoga mat, bottle of water, two granola bars in case I got hungry, wallet, veil, four hip scarves because I like options, and jeans in case I wanted to change before returning home.

The workshop info said to dress in dance layers and my dance friend and I couldn’t figure out quite what that meant. I ended up in black yoga pants with a purple ¾ sleeve crop top, a purple long sleeve vee neck over that, and a gray lightweight long sleeve hoodie over that. The building was warm and the topmost layer came off early.

There was soup for lunch, and head pats for Kiki, and a check of the mailbox (still empty) and then finally it was time to leave. The drive out of Lowell and into Mass Ave in Cambridge had a lot of traffic but was tolerable. I had been to the area just over a month ago, but for some reason, Waze took me a in different way today. This happens a lot, and probably had to do with the traffic.

The workshop was at Dance Complex, a five-story brick building built around 1884 in Central Square. Black tiles spell out IOOF in the entryway for Independent Order of Odd Fellows, whose members built the building for their Fellowship Hall. Now it houses six dance studios and the Julie Ince Thompson Theatre, where we had our workshop.

Our workshop started with some meditation and floor stretches. The space above us had a noisy activity underway that involved heavy thumping on the floor. I kept wishing it was at least in some sort of rhythm, but it wasn’t and I found it annoying. After that hiccup, it was fine because our music was loud enough or the activity above us had simmered down or I had something else to focus on with following the dance teacher.

It was a great two-hour stretch of time with shimmies and hip drops and lifts and veil work. By the time I was in the car to come back home I was feeling the effects of the muscular activity and grateful for the heated seats.

Leaving Cambridge in the rain.

It was raining when we were done, which made the drive home not fun. The reflections on the wet pavement were pretty and also a complicating factor for keeping track of street lane markings. Early in the drive, I missed an important right turn because Waze gave the instruction too late and I wasn’t able to execute it. That resulted in a 15-minute circuitous route to get back on the correct route. 

On the way out of Mass Ave I saw a sign on a building that read “India Palace” and suddenly wanted Indian food. Maybe that’s why I missed the turn. I spent the ride back to Lowell trying to figure out where I could get Indian food, but came up with nothing. I haven’t had Indian food since moving to Lowell, which is also when several other things stopped happening including Korean food and Thai food.

I ended up in Market Basket, hoping to find something from the prepared foods warming station like maybe an eggplant sub or some rice and butternut squash. I took the long way there, through the dairy section for half and half and through the deli for cheese ends but there were none. I got granola bars and tea (Bengal Spice and Fruit Sampler), broccoli, carrots, and mushrooms. At 6:30, there was nothing in the prepared foods but a couple packages of chicken wings. The frozen food section had nothing I found interesting. I ended up getting a bag of corn chips to have with the hot salsa and queso already at the house. It was okay, but definitely not Indian. Maybe tomorrow.