This is me Blogging...

DCDT Promo Video!

cera — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 21:21:12 GMT

i made this last week, i'm pretty happy with it! Check it out! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7K0aATJN8s music by my baby bro =)

Cera & Charlotte play Cabaret Dress Up! Veil, Solo, & Drum Solo Duet! (video post)

cera — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 18:44:25 GMT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEIfkssWgtw We're NEKKID! And JINGLY! and BELLYDANCING!?! Crazy.

independence day, 2008.

cera — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 04:01:09 GMT

we seek ourselves in fantasy - our femininty rawness sensuality our ancientness divinity in Otherness because Ours was stolen from us, each wave coopted corrupted and torn, sexuality turned playland revolution ransacked playing field turned landmines and we turn our backs, we look Elsewhere. but that is not the truth of those women, either - Tribal love sisters dancing in the moonlight those women beaten silent and sewn shut, our sons and brothers rape them because there are no sockhops in bagdad and we do their dances and beat their drums and sing their songs in pants we call harem as though we knew the meaning of the word. as though we know meaning. we will compromise and justify ourselves right out of existance. we have everything in the world. we have every thing in the world and nothing of our own. we have everything in the world to hide from. this sisterhood is fantasy, this Otherness illusion. we prefer them blind because we've robbed them thus. we prefer them silent because could they speak, they may just tell us "no" and our leaders rape their land because ours does not yeild, wet and black when they spread it open. we have everything in the world and nothing to be proud of. we rest easy on someone elses revolution. we ride high on someone elses hog. my people, we sit because we stand for nothing we gorge ourselves because we're not but air and emptiness on the inside. not a fight left in us that means anything. we have everything in the world to fight for. we have every thing in the world.

Cera on PBS! Trailer...

cera — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 19:04:19 GMT

In Fall 2008 you can see me on PBS on the national special "Nourish: Food & Community". I haven't seen it yet, so hopefully I dont come across like a complete tard. Either way, it's something I believe in and am proud to be a part of. Watch the trailer here! http://www.goworldlink.org/programs/video/nourish_trailer.html

notes on choreography...

cera — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 06:04:42 GMT

At The Beginning... Always, before I begin a project, I am restless. What will it be? What will it look like? Who will be in it? Will it be well received? I feel like a hostess waiting for the first guests to arrive at a party. I shift around the studio anxiously, I listen to the same songs over and over, I sweep the studio floor and then sweep it again. Choreographies come to me in different ways. Sometimes – the best times -- they arrive as what can only be called “visions”. Complete with costumes, movement, makeup, lights, plots, storylines hit me in a flash and I busy myself with note taking, I rush to listen to music, to get it all down before I’ve forgotten any detail. Then it is simply the matter of re-constructing the vision in flesh, space, and time. Other times, choreographies labor to be born. The music isn’t right, the concept is vague, the movements wont fit together, the whole thing seems like five different puzzles tossed into the same box. I scan the horizon like a hazy lighthouse, anxious to hone in on something in the distance, soemething to bring into focus, to guide into harbor. Frequently these are commissioned projects, or projects with a slew of constraints – I have a show date and a certain number of dancers, and something must be produced, but I have no idea what, there is no inspiration attached to the deadline. Production on a timeline is difficult, it has little to do with your natural creative process. It requires you to create no matter how you’re feeling or what else is going on in your life. It demands that you come up with something – anything – even if that “anything” is not the project you may currently be more passionate about. Sometimes you must put your own art on the backburner in order to create a project for a deadline. It is never fun to shift your focus to do work that “must” be done, rather than work you “want” to do. (Working on a timeline is something I address more in depth later.) Sometimes it takes only one piece falling into place for all the others to lock in around it – the right piece of music is found, the right dancers become available, the right venue presents itself. Sometimes it only takes one element working itself out for you to see the big picture clearly. Sometimes projects don’t come together at all, and must be abandoned midway. This is very difficult – am I giving up because I am frightened? Lazy? Overwhelmed? Or is the project itself the problem? These are difficult questions. Even those choreographies that arrive as visions are not always easy to come together. There can be conflicts – the right dancers are not available, the concept is too big for the budget, the right music cannot be found or the right composer is not available. Or, simply, sadly, my skills are not yet up to the task. During these times, I must be brutally honest with myself. I must force myself to set the project down, not to rush it. Choreography is artwork, and like all artwork, it will be born when it is good and ready, creator-be-damned. I have learned through awkward experience that work should never be forced to be completed when it is not ready. Artwork, like confessions or apologies, should never be forced, lest they come out hollow, or sad and wasted; A shadow of what they would be if they came of their own volition. I have ruined many a project by my determination to complete it despite the signs that it was not ready to come together. The end result was putting something on stage that I was not proud of, that is a let down to the vision. This is a horrible experience, and one that can be spared by careful introspection during the choreographic process, a willingness to ask myself (and others) questions, and be receptive to the answers. It also requires a willingness to sit my dancers down a few weeks into rehearsing a piece and say “we’re starting over with something new – no matter how strange or screwed up that may seem, it will be better than forcing work that is not ready. We will come back to this another time.” But that is later. Today is the start of a new project, and I am restless. I have swept the studio 3 times, done all the dishes, made and remade the bed, started a load of laundry, and finally sat down to write these words - anything to keep myself from confronting the blank canvass ahead of me. This is the scariest moment, the plunge we all take time and time again: To make a first mark on the page, the first sweep of color on the canvass, to take the first breath, and then step, gingerly or with abandon, into space, hoping that our foot hits solid ground.

Vote Cera, DCDT, & Shoebox for SF's BEST OF THE BAY!

cera — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 19:31:02 GMT

Hey all, it's time for the SF Guardian's Best of the Bay! You can nominate your favorite Dance Company, Dance Studio, and Personal Trainer! Please take the time to nominate Damage Control Dance Theater as your favorite Dance Company (page 2) Shoebox Studio as your favorite dance studio (page 4) and Cera, Shoebox Studio as your favorite personal trainer (page 4)! http://www.sfbg.com/bob/2008/ A lot of you have asked in recent weeks what you can do to help the studio - THIS HELPS. the winner of BOB gets HUGE publicity for free, and it would REALLY help the studio! So please, vote yourself, repost this, tell your friends! Every vote counts =D

i accidentally made an ipod commercial. (video post)

cera — Sun, 11 May 2008 20:33:12 GMT

i swear i wasn't planning this when i danced it.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_rEI3a40Lg

new costume item (video post)

cera — Tue, 06 May 2008 03:03:55 GMT

inspired a round of "let's pretend to be a bellydancer" http://youtube.com/watch?v=9M2X_fUDIOY sometimes, it's all about the costuming.

birfday wish!

cera — Mon, 05 May 2008 21:22:32 GMT

a few of you have asked what i want for my birthday. the answer is: nothing for me, BUT, I would happily accept donations for the studio. if you are inspired to give anything, please just do so in the form of sending a buck or two to shoeboxstudio@gmail.com via paypal, and i will consider myself sufficiently birfdayed. i love you guys!

freestyle (video post)

cera — Sun, 04 May 2008 20:00:25 GMT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yxj9AoxiBV4 also, DCDT is holding an open rehearsal and Q&A today from 5-8 at the box. With wine and cookies! Come on by!

here's what i have to say on the eve of my 26th year.

cera — Sat, 03 May 2008 02:19:43 GMT

want. a life characterized by tremendous wanting. it never. fucking. stops. i look at everything i've ever done and see only everything i haven't yet accomplished. there is no time to be proud in the face of such insurmountable wanting. there is no room for congratulations. there is nothing to celebrate. only so many long roads laid out before me, and so much fear that i will not have time to tread them all, at least a little bit. whoever said "life isn't a sprint, it's a marathon" obviously didn't have that many places to go, wasn't worried about missing anything. also, was probably male, and therefor commercially viable for a much longer timeframe. there is limited time. i have limited time. there is limited oxygen and there are limited beats and i have limited shimmies and limited chest pops and limited pirouettes and limited leaps and limited songs to sing and limited stages to walk and i will run out someday before i've gotten through them all, before i've gotten to do them everywhere i want to, before i've gotten to bite through whatever it is that burns metallic on the back of my tongue with need. there is this ephemeral sense of greatness that plauges me, which i know, no matter how much i accomplish, i will never achieve. it's all good. dont get me wrong. but it will never be good ENOUGH. there's always so much farther. somedays, that is exciting. others, i am so tired i dont know how i manage to push through at all.

The Bellydance Mafia! Shoebox Studio Troupe (video post)

cera — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 00:36:07 GMT

These girls rock my world! i am so, so, so proud of these dancers. this is the first official unveiling of the Shoebox Studio Troupe, The Bellydance Mafia. (sadly minus our Sheila, in this video). I know I should wait for the show video, but I cant help myself. They've worked so hard - they finished this entire piece in 2 rehearsals! they are pure joy to dance with, and i love them. Opa Cupa! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiFPsewHbrE

Hip Hop Fusion w/ Cera- New Routine starts TONIGHT!

cera — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 19:06:28 GMT

We're starting a new choreo tonight, so it's a perfect time to join! Hip Hop Fusion is a high energy blend of Hip Hop, Funk, Bellydance, and Afro-Caribbean dance forms sure to get your heart pounding, your hips shaking, and your sass-machine workin overtime! When: 6:30-8pm Where: Shoebox Studio, 855 Folsom St. #112, btwn 4th & 5th Level: Some dance experience strongly recommended $15 drop in, $13 w/ 10-Class Card http://www.shoeboxsf.com

if you have hesitated, you've already missed it. [video entry]

cera — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 01:02:20 GMT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgGnkc5ToMU sometimes i speak this other language. and it is raw and primal and full of shrieks and growls. it is eloquent and strong and perfect. it is the only tongue that feels like home, again and again, that i can leave for weeks and slip into like the skin i forgot has always been my own. it is a language rich in vowels and consonants and in-betweens, foreign and strangely familiar, even to those who think they've never heard it before. it is a language without a word for apology, a life without regret. i am so grateful to have heard it, to have beckoned to it, to be able to speak it and teach it and revel in its peculiarity and laugh at it's quirks and sweat through its twists and turns. it is the greatest gift this world has ever given me, and endebtedness is the fuel that drives passion toward its limits. i will spend the rest of my life saying this thank you. there is so much laughter on this floor. and tears. and joy. and fear. and conquest. it is the richest life there is. and cruel. and merciful. of what use is a life that does not make you bleed? that does not make you cry? that does not call you, again and again, into yourself; demanding that you set your ego aside and lay prostrate before all you do not know, and cannot yet do? give me a life with a beat. a life that will use me up and spit me out, breathless, on the other side. **** i'm taking a knife to the books that i own and i'm chopping and chopping and boiling stick from stones. things i have loved i'm allowed to keep.

i will witness you.

cera — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 19:26:29 GMT

I will offer passionate vigor, unflinching, challenging, and sympathetic space. I will witness you. I will travel down roads in the body which are difficult to see and hard to navigate. I will move without apology. I will share the dangerous tasks. We will learn about limitations and resistance, about failure and insecurity, about the personal world and the universal world, about fire and water, about generosity and faith. We will learn about diligence and fatigue. We will traverse the fragile line between control and surrender, open the space between the inner and outer world and spin new identities. We will investigate the fertile, fecund information that resides in the body. Class will be scalding, cleansing, startling and enervating. I will be safe. Class will be scary. You will move inside barometric tension. You will find a proper sleep and awakening. You will feel the tide of natural order, see bright and dark, move with absolute desire. You will be a miracle of information and I will witness you. -alexandra beller http://www.radiancemagazine.com/issues/2000/winter_00/win2000_beller.htm

holy jeez...

cera — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 19:53:04 GMT

doing studio payroll... including the few classes i subbed, i taught 23 classes at the studio in january. many days i taught more than once a day. if you add in the classes i taught at the highschool, i taught 40 classes in January (or about 52 hours - oh wait! maybe more like 56-58 if you count the dance-a-thon). maybe that's why i'm sore all the time. Unfortunately, I think i only took about 8 classes, and probably only practiced on my own 5 or 6 times, and i only got about 12 hours with DCDT. in february, i would like to balance these numbers a little bit more. more taking class, less teaching class, thanks. off to hobble my ass downstairs and teach more pilates...

Zaghareet Magazine Nominations open now - DCDT fans, we need your help!

cera — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 23:05:25 GMT

Zaghareet nominations are open now for your 2008 favorites! With catagories such as: Favorite Interpretive Artist Troupe of the Year Best Kept Secret of 2008 Instructor of the Year DCDT fans - You know what to do! Rally the troops and send your nominations by April 15, 2008 to Zaghareet!, P.O. Box 1809, Elizabeth City, NC 27906 or e-mail zaghareetmagazine@earthlink.net. The nominations will be announced in the May/June issue! Tell everyone who your favorites are!! Please vote only once in each category and be sure to include your name and address. Only individual votes will be accepted, so please do not submit petitions, rosters or lists of names.

advice from Alice In Wonderland, as sung by cera (mp3 post)

cera — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 21:46:16 GMT

http://www.damage-control.org/mp3s/verygoodadvice.mp3 i give myself very good advice but i very seldom follow it and that explains the trouble i'm always in be patient is very good advice but the waiting makes me curious and i love the change should something strange begin yes i love the change should something strange begin i went along my merry way i never stopped to reason i should've known there'd be a price to pay some day i give myself very good advice but i very seldom follow it will i ever learn to do the things i should?

Anyone wanna house a Wayward Dancer in VEGAS?

cera — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 02:02:16 GMT

Hey friends! I'll be in Vegas March 3-9 to study with ms. brice and perform at The Massive Spectacular (with DCDT) at the Boulder Creek Casino in Vegas. I'd loooooooooooove to crash with a fellow dancer! anyone down there willing to put me up? I'm an awesome houseguest! I cook! I clean! I keep to myself! I tell funny jokes! I'm housebroken!

Shit. I got MemePinged.

cera — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 06:44:50 GMT

I dont think i've done one of these before, but i got pinged, so here it be. Four jobs I have had in my life: (in no particular order) 1.) Focus Group Moderator and Recruiter for Qualitative Marketing Research Firm 2.) Agent for Hair/Makeup Artists, Costume Stylists, and Set Designers for SF Print + Film Industry 3.) Art Gallery Owner/Operator 4.) Dance Teacher at All Girls Catholic Highschool (present) Movies I've watched more than once: (only four???) 1.) Henry & June 2.) Anchor Man, the Legend of Ron Burgundy 3.) City of Lost Children 4.) Amelie Four places I have lived: (again, only four!?!) 1.) Oakland, CA 2.) Berkeley, CA 3.) New Orleans, LA 4.) Palma Soriano/Santiago, Cuba Four T.V. Shows that I watch: (no TV, but...) 1) I occasionally go nuts and download America's Next Top Model from iTunes 2) clips of old SNL online 3) clips of the Daily Show online 4) I used to obsessively watch Law & Order. And Rags to Riches, anyone remember Rags to Riches? Four Places I have been: 1.) Across Cuba in a bus 2.) Down the Yang Tze River in a boat, visiting all of the provinces that were being demolished for the construction of the dam 3.) All over the US on greyhound 4.) Baja, Mexico Four people who e-mail me: 1.) potential shoebox students 2.) deborah & omar, even when they're sitting right next to me 3.) i'd say damage control, but really it's more like i email them and they txt msg me. 4.) shoebox teachers Four of my favorite foods: 1.) coffee 2.) salad 3.) anything indian 4.) french fries Four places I would rather be right now: 1.) Having sex on the bathroom floor of a truckstop in memphis (okay, maybe not) 2.) In dance class 3.) On Stage 4.) Wrapped in Omar's arms (which will happen in T-minus as soon as i finish this) Four things I am looking forward to in the next year: 1) Taking at least 4 classes a week NO MATTER WHAT 2) Choreographing bigger and better pieces for DCDT 3) Celebrating my 1year anniversary with Omar 4) Watching the ShoeBox become bigger, better, smoother, swankier Four people who I think should take this survey: 1. Omar 2. Brad 3. Claire 4. Bo

Mermaids...

cera — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 20:52:16 GMT

i am so, so proud to present "I Thought the Sea", from Damage Control's New Years performance. I think it is the best choreography I've ever made. This wasnt our best run, but it was (unfortunately) the best lit room we performed in. Awful lighting! Mermaid Pants by the amazing Katherine Summer (www.katherinesummer.com). Music is "To rest near you" by Rachel's, and excerpts of "Brazilian Sun" by CocoRosie. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f1lQUn-Y-k

She felt like every broken nose in reverse (and another...)

cera — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 21:08:27 GMT

Everyday of this american life... (the beginnings of something, i'm not sure what....) *** under a flood of florescent sunshine that bleaches pompoms, pigtails, and hungry teenaged boy hands, the asphalt makes a viscious barrier against 1 inch of liquor splattering empty glass. splitting the warm october middle of nowhere, the sweet astroturf smells like everyday of this american life - like every day dad hit you for never going pro or becoming a rockstar; helpless, you are are all that is left of the star he never became and he spreads you like an asteroid of blood and bone against the soft white of his worn hanes tshirt. you take it because it keeps him away from mom: the prom queen everyone always knew was too good for the likes of him, but no one would ever say so out loud. she sings while she makes grilled cheese and cries sometimes into her diet cola. dad and johnny walker go on long walks and he comes home flinging bottles at the front of the house screaming hot and desperate. if you didnt know better you might think he sounded angry. when he starts threatening to shoot the neighbors mom comes out and stands in front of the door. you dont get out of bed, but you watch the scene through closed eyes and a haze of vicodin you bought from your best school friend: it plays out the same way it has since you were small and soft, with your sticky mouth and runny nose pressed paralyzed against the cool glass of your bedroom window. daddy would go to her and drop to his knees and mamma would stiffen for a moment, and then relent, muscles melting away cruelty and indifference, she'd hold the drenched face he pressed to her belly and you'd feel the fear drain from your small body and make a long puff of steam against the pane - you hadn't even realized you were holding your breath. that night you'd know that he'd wrap himself around her like a drowning man clinging to life and you'd wonder why she wouldn't just let him go under. that was all before. you turned 16 and your acne faded. you grew into your gangly limbs, and all those years of fear and fight made you a hero on the football field. you met a pretty girl and invited her to the homecoming dance. you still have the pink panties she'd been wearing beneath her dress. she cried a little when you peeled them off but she felt like every broken nose in reverse as she spread for you like butter across the back seat of your best friends car. you told her you loved her. after games sometimes she asks you about college and you get so angry that you start to shake and you worry that you'll break her. you steal liquor and pills try grass and blow walk alone on the train tracks throwing change on the tracks when the trains go by. you're never sure if you should jump on them or in front of them but you cringe at the thought of ruining your letterman jacket. mom makes you a concoction of pepto and raw egg the morning after you get brought home in a cop car drunk and bleeding, stumbling and swinging so hard it took 4 of them to get you in the house. it took 6 phone calls to fill in the blanks on what happened after that last bottle you put down behind the bleachers recounting the glory from that nights game at the top of your teenaged lungs. for your 18th birthday you bought a gun and promised your girlfriend never to use it. for your 21st birthday you broke that promise and got 4 years in santa rita. every year inside you got a tattoo for your birthday: sweet ones that mom would like if she could find a way not to hate them on principle. * * *

words from 2007....

cera — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 21:05:39 GMT

there reaches a point in the experience of the meta-narrative that you realize you are nostalgizing the present even as it is happening; thinking while having a conversation that you are having a conversation that will never be had again, that you are in a room you will never be in again - because even if you return to the same location, at the same time of day, at the same time of year, in the same outfit again, you yourself will be different, and your experience of it will be changed. events no longer original immediately become the happenstance of memory, the experience of life as story, the eternal process of storying, and the retelling of oneself as character in life as structure. you are 13 and sick with wanting; you are mentally ill and destroying yourself. you faint in the shower. your hair comes out in clumps. you take ballet class every day and count your ribs in the mirror - not in the front, but from the back, cartiledge clinging like a ships mast to the small bones of your spine. you are 15 and having sex with everyone who will stop long enough to touch you, even if you hate them, and you know they hate you back, even if they dont know it yet. they hate your body, they think you're too big. they hate your intellect, they think you're too smart, they feel judged and they dont know why. they are not interested in finding out. you are smart enough to enjoy being objectified. you are removed enough to enjoy the retelling of your own experience as object later, when you're alone with your pen. you are 20. 2 years married, running your own business. you are again sick and destroying yourself. your body looks distended and yellowed. you marvel at your own strange will. you want your husband to know everything but you are so in love with your own secret that you can not tell. you want him to know you're sick. you want him to care. but to tell him would be to admit that you didnt have everything in control, that you were scared, that you still weren't ready for love, so you do not tell. you love him so much that you cry in your sleep. you pray for him at night, to a god you havent recognized since childhood, a god you conceived as aliens watching you on video from space, like satelites. somehow, deep down, you know that if you could ever just tell him these things, you would already be getting better. you are afraid to get better. you are 22 and soon graduating college. building a career that seems like a fantasy. traveling the world. engaging in polishing the shell of a relationship that hasn't housed a creature like love for years. spinning your wheels. you write about yourself in the third person. you write a fictional book about a young couple. the girl is starving herself to death, she is in love with her own bones, and the man is troubled and overwrought, gradually moving toward overcome. you insist on it's complete falsehood. it is a story. you made it up. when you fight it feels like your entire world is being rended to pieces. this is the only home you've ever known, and you are watching it crumble. aware enough to see the ground while you plummet toward it. you find grey hair. you notice crows feet. you realize, for the first time, that you do not want to die. it is not the realization that shocks you - it's how shocking the realization is. it is the shock itself that hurts. most people know all the time, on some appreciable level, that they do not want to die, dont they? that this should be a new notion for you is so simple and sad that it can not even ache. how flavorless is self hatred that you can take for granted? how banal. you are 24 and for the first time in your life, your ribs are not the abacus of your worth, the bone beads you count endlessly as proof of your own existance. you make things, every day, instead. your marraige has given way to a strange and begrudging respect, a silent distance, a quiet ache that will not be resolved, and must simply be let go - like youth, like the foolish mistakes you made in the pursuit of your own equillibrium. a step you took closer to yourself. you nest into yourself, and all the while you are toiling, toiling, toiling to make the representations of this experience. you are your own diligent amenuensis, your own stenographer, your own cartographer, your own vice cop, surveilence camera, creepy obsessed stalker. you follow yourself taking notes. again you sleep with anyone who will stop long enough to touch you, but this time it is to marvel at how little of it you felt the first time - how you laid there and thought only of how disgusting your flesh must feel to someone as beautiful as the posessor of the hands that scaled over your body like bone spiders. you know that you laid there only to prove to yourself, by some perverse logic, how worthless you were as anything but a piece of flesh, and what a sorry representation you were for that, as well. it seems strange to write these words now, knowing how intimately i know the hate, and yet how removed i am from feeling it. how did i come to feel so strong, so fast? and how has love taught me this ground, and how do i walk it now as though it was always meant to be mine? most days i do not even think of death. most days i dont remember being the girl who fantasized about the smashing of her own face against concrete stairs.

if you are a mermaid, then i am the sea....

cera — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 22:21:57 GMT

mermaid makeup practice...

improv of the day (video post)

cera — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 05:34:07 GMT

wind up dancer. http://youtube.com/watch?v=gPsM0qU0ngk