Some moments you wish you could capture and imprint upon your memory forever. Or next best, wish that someone had a video camera, or an audio recorder at just the right time. In more solid times we could have called upon the public artist to paint up a masterpiece to later jog our fickle memory. Or the community bard to make us the heroine of our own oral lineage.

Last nite, in sultry Gainesville Florida, I had one of those moments.

I could try to describe how giddy I felt all day imagining gators in the swamps. Working out at the gym and getting a great massage. Washing two months of life out of these naughty dreads. These things I can write to you about. I can write about how feisty I felt putting on a tropical dress and being escorted, along with my cast mates, to the front row of the Hippodrome Theatre that evening. Belly laughing at a hilarious local Equity production of Shear Madness, or how delightful the pool party they threw us afterwards was, casts mingling, becoming immediate friends.

Of course there were many beautiful bodies diving and giggling. Often elaborate displays of strength or daring, in true performer fashion, with inflatable props and splashing solos. In true raw food fashion, I concocted a glass of Riesling with fresh local blueberries, strawberries and apples (oh, Life!). And in true STOMPer fashion, eventually the inevitable create-your-own-music fest happened with high hat hands, base board feet, and a circle of snaps, raps and melody adding accents.

Of course these things happened, which often do when creative people are put together in a space of almost any sort. But then there was that moment---the kind that doesn’t happen every time. The kind that is oh so impossible to describe. When recent strangers become instant connections through a rare and fleeting expressive experience---in this case, an organic moment involving poetry, melody and dance. Three people willingly offering their most vulnerable for amalgamation with the other’s, feeling natural...simple...easy.

Without lessening the experience by quantifying it, I will leave it to be known simply and only, as art. And in lieu of any digital recording equipment or Medieval poet, I am left to appreciate this experience via memory---glad that, in true theatre fashion, there were eyes that witnessed and lives that were touched.

Life is made of moments like these. You never know when or with whom they are going to happen. Last nite at a pool in Gainesville Florida, two strangers and I made art.

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