I think I’ve had the most wonderfully random Sunday morning ever, and that really is saying something.

I was questioning if I’d finally gone fully nuts.

This morning, I chucked on a flowing red dress, a long brown wig and headed off to Haworth. Penistone Hill to be specific, where hundreds of others in red dresses had gathered for The Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever.

This event has become a bit of feature ever July in cities across the world. The idea is you dress as Kate Bush (or is it technically Cathy?) and all learn the Kate Bush Wuthering Heights dance, together. I’ve seen news stories about them and thought “how gloriously bonkers”. Friends would send me news stories about them, and I’d make a passing comment about signing up. Never actually did it though.

When the advert for the Howarth event popped up on my Insta (the algorithm can be scarily accurate sometimes), I couldn’t really resist. I was reading Catherine at the time; I had been to Howarth and had interviewed Sam at the Parsonage Museum. I was basically in a Bronte/Wuthering Heights/Kate Bush bubble so bought the ticket as soon as they went on sale. It’s a good job I did because it sold out in no time. 

It turns out lots of people want to wear red dresses and throw themselves around fields.

After eagerly buying the ticket all those months ago, I kind of put the whole enterprise to the back the mind until about two weeks ago when the event page on Facebook started to explode with updates.

The questions about whether people were practicing panicked me a little. I mean the only practicing of that dance I’ve ever done is when I’ve been drunk and then I’ve made it up. So, was I supposed to arrive at this mass wuther fully prepared and good? Because that certainly wasn’t happening.

I started to debate turning up at all.

I was starting to get a bit self-conscience if I’m being totally honest.

I might give it the whole “I don’t care what people think” schtick, and for the most that is true but every now and again, I do feel a bit self-conscience, and this was one of those occasions.

I’d mentioned this event to a few people who seemed to think I’d lost the plot….or they at least gave me the impression that’s what they were thinking, anyway. 

Also, I’m not much of a performer and I was beginning to worry about looking stupid.

That in itself, was stupid. More on that later.

I used to be a bit of performer. When I was kid, I didn’t care about getting up on stage and belting out a song or dancing but then something changed. I’d say that changed around year 9 All Saints High school, I became a bit too concerned with what other people thought and fitting in, like the majority of teenagers. It turns out it can take a long time to unlearn that mindset.

Arriving in Haworth, it didn’t take long to spot the red dresses. It was quite a site watching all these people tramp through the Yorkshire countryside in bright red dresses. The weather was famously Yorkshire, it was grey, windy and wet…..fairly appropriate for a morning’s wuthering!

I was still feeling a bit self-conscience but all that soon disappeared. I was basically surrounded by hundreds of people who had the same Kate Bush/Wuthering Heights obsession as me and as soon as Running Up That Hill started blasting out over the Yorkshire moors as we warmed up, you couldn’t help but get drawn into the day.

By the time we’d completed two rehearsals and were limbered up for the proper ‘Wuther”, there was a huge smile on my face. I was on my own, but I didn’t care. I had no idea what I was doing but I didn’t care. I was absolutely soaked to the bone, but I didn’t care. I looked around the field and saw people of all ages, sexes and backgrounds just having a good time, smiling, laughing and flinging themselves around a field to Kate Bush. It was wonderful.

By the end of it, I wasn’t a pro. I had picked up the routine no bother and I’d had a bloody good time; it was so wholesome. I can’t believe I was debating swerving it, I came away with a massive high and it gave me a lot to think about.

Now I’m mum to a little girl, I want her to grow up confident and believing in her convictions. I don’t want her to stop doing the things she enjoys because it’s not seen as cool or someone else doesn’t get it. I want her to move through life not giving a toss about what others think; and for her to do that, I need to get better at doing that myself.

I guess that means I’ll be dancing in the rain more often!