The Sweetie and I attended an amazing event the other night at the Baycrest Centre to support our dear friend Sarah Robichaud. She is the founder of Dancing With Parkinson’s, an organization that helps people with Parkinson’s Disease through dance and music. Sarah runs a dance class twice a week for people with Parkinson’s, helping them find a way to enjoy freedom within their bodies. Studies are now showing that music and dancing helps initiate movement and bypass pathways in the brain affected by lack of dopamine. It’s an exciting and hopeful prospect.

The event provided an opportunity to see what happens in the class, as well as seeing choreographed performances. It was incredible to witness the grace and beauty of the performers.

What is even more striking is seeing the joy these people obviously feel when dancing and how movement makes them feel like their body is their own again rather than being at the mercy of this awful disease. The courage, dignity and humour of the people on stage was astounding. I spent the entire evening crying into a single crumpled and very damp tissue.

Sarah is an inspiration. Many of her dance students commented that she is the light in their week and that her energy, charisma and enthusiasm keeps them going. I was struck by the love and energy she pours into this project. It almost made me forgive her for also being drop dead gorgeous and having a gravity defying dancer’s body with an apple bum. She ruins my catty and desperate theory that beautiful women can’t also be smart and kind and funny.

It was an entertaining and positive evening. It was also a true perspective maker which I need on a regular basis. I may bitch about my pot belly and saddlebags (and I bitch a lot) but when I am reminded of how lucky I am to have a body that is healthy and functional I realize I have no reason to complain.  I sometimes need a good slap on the face to take me out of my vanity induced haze. So nice that this slap arrived in the form of a gentle, beautiful performance. I came away from it awed, humbled and inspired.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 20th, 2009 at 3:28 pm and is filed under Toronto Dates . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.