FEB 2025 - how I’m movin’ through it

Trying this out… thank you for being here <3

If you have thoughts on anything, please let me know. I think so much of this life is sort of one-way communication speaking into an echo-chamber. I’d love to hear about you and your life and what you are learning along the way. Text me anytime (636) 352-6082 or reach me by email marleedoniff@gmail.com

MOVES

This month has felt generative. I am making phrase work that I actually really like (WOAH!). I consider myself a somewhat extreme person; all or nothing most of the time. I am working on getting deep into the middle of any two things. Finding a lot there. I find so much more when I am generating movement for the sake of generating movement as opposed to working on something specific. There is an openness to it. I am surprising myself a bit with the moves I am putting together these days. It’s exciting. I am noticing the way I use transitions. How I sort of don’t. I just abandon an idea when I am sick of it and I am interested in rejecting the notion that I have to skillfully transition from one move/theme into the next. Life transitions are seldom seamless and my brain rarely moves from one idea to the next in a cohesive way; why would my dancing not reflect these truths?

I’m considering Ballet a lot… How it somehow feels like home to me despite the fact that I have never really been welcome in it. I think there is a layer of playing pretend in Ballet for me. For an hour and twenty minutes I can try on a different persona. I put on silly leg-warmers and I am transformed. I think it helps that I stopped trying to become a better Ballet dancer. That changed Ballet for me. I no longer feel like I am trying to fit this mold I simply (and objectively) do not. Ballet is like church to me I think. But without the morality. There is also something inherently queer about doing something despite not fulfilling the expectations of it. I want there to be more dykes in Ballet. Maybe I will be that dyke.

I’ve also started an incredibly fruitful and magical process with Jennifer Monson. I will write much more about this soon, but just want to acknowledge it.

STARDOM

At the beginning of this month, I performed in Stunning! by the amazingly brilliant Gabriel Bruno Eng Gonzalez. I had this moment when I was performing the work on the final night where I realized that stunningness actually has nothing to do with beauty. For my whole life, I thought I wanted to be beautiful, but I think I really want to be stunning. Not in the sense of “extremely impressive or attractive.” No, no, no. I want to stun, “astonish or shock (someone) so that they are temporarily unable to react.” I know I am loved, but I feel greedy with it. I want to be loved more. Honestly, I want to be loved the most. I want to be everyone’s favorite person. I want people to cheer for me. I want to be laughed at. I want to be missed. I want to be devoured. Not tasted, devoured. Then I want to be thrown up and eaten again. I know that is crazy. And gross. And selfish. I know that I am capable of being all those things. I know deep down, I am all those things. 

In my execution of this work, I stunned myself. I was bold and brave and other worldly. I was never the type of dancer to get the solo. I sort of just swayed in the background for several years. I didn’t realize how much it meant to me to be seen in my truest, most ugly and beautiful at the same time, form. I often wonder if coming to grad school at this point in my life was the right choice. Maybe I should be in the real world making work or building wealth or traveling the world. But then, I got to work with Gabe. Had I not come to Grad School on a whim at this exact moment in time, we may not have crossed paths until some other time in life or another lifetime entirely. Being in Gabe’s process showed me that being here, in the corn, was in fact the best decision I could have ever made for myself.

I also may have stunned some other systems in my life because my long-term relationship ended the next day. In this month of love, I am declaring my art to be my new lover. Stardom has really always been my deepest love. I feel gross admitting that, but I know it is also true. Honestly, I am stunning myself with the ways I am moving through this time. Sitting in the beauty of things being so terrible and so wonderful all at the same time. Feeling more present in my life here (Urbana) and dreaming so big about the future. I am happy I never gave my dreams. That my me-ness was always more important. Perhaps that was the sign. Well, I don’t think I actually believe in “the one.” Which is sort of the reason we ended, I was not “the one” to her. I am not one. I am many and everything and so much larger than one-ness. I am stunning.

TEACHING

I’m finding so much joy in teaching these days. I am working with college-aged beginner dancers. Many of them have never taken a dance class in their life. I think dancing is the closest thing we have to magic. So many people are so unaware of all the things their body can do for them and what they in turn can do for it. Our bodies are the only constant of this life, to be in deep conversation with it is, to me, essential for understanding oneself. I love seeing someone think about an exercise, see their wheels turning. I love seeing them start to get it. The slow progression from beginner, to grasping with certain concepts, to full release, to lifelong learner. Allowing someone to access the joy of movement is truly such a gift. To move and be moved, connecting with oneself on a deeper level, trying new things, allowing yourself to fail, commitment to impossible tasks. I think dance builds character and kindness and wisdom unlike anything else I have ever known.

GREIF… again

Friday, February 7 was the 3 year anniversary of my mom’s death. I still feel so defined by the loss of her. Here is some writing I haven’t shared about that yet…

jan 14, 2025:

sometimes i fantasize about running into someone who hasn’t seen me in a really long time. someone who knew me when i was small. before all this. before you. they, of course, knew you too. they knew you well and loved you. we start to catch up and they excitedly ask, “oh and how’s your mom?” somehow, they don’t know. they don’t know your fate. they don’t know what happened to you 3 years ago or what was happening to you when they really knew you. i get to lie. i tell them the version of your life i made up in my head somewhere along the way. the one where you’re living in kansas city still and that’s why you’re not around. you got your dream job. dad moved there after colin graduated high school. we spend every thanksgiving there, together, the four of us. we go on vacation together every summer and you love to come and watch me dance. just like you did when they knew you. 

you’re not gone. you’re still here. and i didn’t have to become this person i am now. i’m happier and somehow prettier and probably nicer and more successful and regulated. i don’t spend every day feeling completely alone. i don’t sit at the gas pump crying in my car writing stupid shit like this. 

in reality, this probably will happen sometime. and i won’t be brave enough to lie. i’ll say “oh you didn’t hear she died.” or maybe i’ll say passed away or she’s no longer with us or some other jumbled set of words that still feels awkward coming out three years on. 3 years later and I still quiver every time i have to utter the words “my mom died.”

feb 11, 2025: (in response to finishing The Body Artist by Don Delillo)

I lost my mom a few years ago and sometimes I have to watch a video to remember what her laugh sounded like, but I remember our last conversation together in ridiculous detail.

The grief that is typically portrayed in media is the big dramatic moments, but it is really much more mundane than that. Doing the dishes and remembering that moment you shared, or walking into a coffee shop and randomly smelling her perfume, or seeing someone that you swear could be her. It never goes away. It just sort of gets sewn into your life in subtle ways that you learn to live with and even sometimes love because it is the only way they continue to live on. 

ETC.

I typed this and realized it is also the title of a work I am performing in next month. No organization has done more for my development as an artist than Space Station. Working with Jacob is so special. Come support him and Space Station and this really inventive work.

I am going back to ADF this summer — yay! I’ve realized just how much my summers in Durham sending emails, watching more dance than the rest of the year combined, and being surrounded by talent and brilliance shapes me into a better person. ADF feels more sacred than ever; I feel really honored to get to support the important work they do in such a vital way.

I am still anti-instagram at the moment. For many reasons like oligarchy, and dependency, and the attention economy, and a whole bunch of other annoying sort of made up words. I have been using Pinterest in the way I used to use instagram and I am really enjoying it.

I learned how to poach an egg. Sort of reminding me that it is never to late to do something you are scared of.

If you have made it this far, thank you again.

mdoniff