My body knows it has memory, of pristine lines in brightly lit dance studios, floors speckled with rosin and grit, smelling of pine, hairspray, sweat. Clean things. Bright things. Moving with easy memory of millions of plies at the barre, in the centre, in preparation for every movement, catching the end of every step, jump, turn.
My body has wisdom, it knows what it knows. I need to find it’s wisdom to succeed as a writer, but I have it trapped on my bed, in a room in someone else’s house. My body is experiencing worlds of knowledge through a tiny laptop screen and mobile internet, guided to mind bending new understandings thanks to the curation of the Master of Arts (Writing). I am learning, but have yet to listen to my body to create.
This trained body is scared, this environment is hostile to its knowledge. The spaces I have available to move here are covered in shit – horse, cow, dog – the air is full of things that bite, the sun heavy on my skin. My feet want to be bare, want to feel the earth, but are quickly stuck with sharply dried grasses and stones, every touch a threat. The patches of green lawn in front of the house is a space vulnerable to judgement by the woman behind the picture windows, whose body knows how to ride a horse and when to wean calves. It is also the place I swept the redback nests from the outdoor furniture.
This body has learned to adapt in its years: from dry baking heat and grasshoppers, to playing for hours in three foot snow drifts, followed by hot chocolate in front of an open fire. It has adapted to discipline, abandon, depression, ecstatic joy. It has swung from fearlessly creating and pursuing passions, to plodding through every day in a job. It has known poverty, abundance, food as fuel and gourmet home cooking, five star hotels and flea infested sleeping bags.
The writer must adapt and document the process, and the scholar must document the process of documenting the process of adaptation.
Sarah Bonnar 