mizChartreuse || redefiningSuccess

While perusing the crazy stuff I’ve written about over the years (thanks to my great new WordPress plugin which generates related posts at the end of each entry), I re-stumbled upon the blog from the two days I spent learning and teaching the dance for Oprah’s 24th Season Kickoff Party back in September.

I finally found a great, high-quality video of the actual Oprah taping, and watching this video truly MAKES MY LIFE. For those of you who didn’t read about/see it before, I was part of the group of dancers who were enlisted to learn a flash mob performance for the start of the season. Last summer, I was obsessed (like, it was sickening and unhealthy) with the Black Eyed Peas’ latest record, The E.N.D., and when I received the offer to be an “official” dancer, I was OMGFAVORITEBANDFAVORITEQUEENOFMEDIADANCINGDROOL all over the place, and had to do it.

And this was the result. Even if you’ve already seen it, WATCH IT AGAIN IN HD.

Seriously, is it not the best thing you’ve ever seen in your life EVER?

I recently read a blog that asked the reader to contemplate the time when they were most happy. I couldn’t think of THE GREATEST moment of my life at the time, because my near-24 years have been filled with some incredible experiences. But this day takes the cake.

Yes, this is an actual photo from my amazing camera.

I can’t help smiling while watching that performance because I remember the madness of it all. I was performing a well-choreographed, super-synchronized dance with over 20,000 people, in my favorite city, to my favorite song of the summer, for my favorite journalist/Queen of the World.

I was in the third group that joins the procession of the flash mob.

Everyone was doing the dance. All. Day. Long.

There’s something about synchronicity that is so exhilirating. On a later episode of Oprah, two people in the audience who were there that day in the sweaty crowd talked about the experience, and one of them described it as “joy rising.”

It sounds cheesy, but it REALLY WAS. The two days of non-stop rehearsal, the standing around in the Chicago summer heat, the inevitable connections made among the people we were crowded with…doing a “dress rehearsal” with the Black Eyed Peas before taping…the final moment of redemption where it was time to perform and nail it…it was just an amazing day, and one I will carry with me forever.

What was the best day of YOUR life?