About
I started my ballet training at the age of 2, in a sparkly leotard at the community center. From there, I went to Pacific Northwest Ballet School, where I trained until the age of 13. In between school years, I participated in summer intensives at International Ballet Academy and Ballet Hawaii, but the training ended when I threw a fit at not getting promoted to the next level and I left ballet altogether.
Or rather, I left it physically, but it followed me. I watched my friends perform at their local Nutcrackers and I really wanted to go back--I took about two open classes in five years and that was the best of my efforts.
When I was eighteen, I went to college and the spring of my freshman year, something happened to my back. I am still unsure what it was, but I was unable to move and I needed to leave the door open so that my roommates could communicate with me. As I recovered and finished the semester, I wrote one sentence in my journal:
"I want to be a dancer again."
I didn't think much of that sentence, but I just knew I had no stamina and my back was killing me. I started attending open classes at the Washington Ballet and did Pilates, but that was mostly it.
The next spring, three students in my dorm passed away suddenly, almost within a week of each other, and my roommates and I essentially realized that life is short and we couldn't just sit around and let it pass.
I started taking classes at Joy of Motion DC and through the George Washington University, before living in France for a year and training at La Perverie High School, L'Universite de Nantes, and Elephant Paname in Paris with three amazing teachers.
After returning to the States, during my senior year of college I took seven classes a week at Maryland Youth Ballet, modern dance twice a week through GWU, and Bikram yoga four times a week at a studio in Dupont.
I trained for a year at the Joffrey Ballet School in New York full time, spent a year as a trainee with State Street Ballet of Santa Barbara, and am now a conservatory student at A&A Ballet of Chicago.
It's a lot of work. Dancers will tell you that all the time, and these are the incredibly dedicated dancers who have been training their whole lives. I, on the other hand, am playing catch up. While I will probably never join a professional state ballet company, I do know that my dream is to dance professionally.
I will be able to write policy and international memos forever, but my body will only be capable of ballet for so long. So I decide that I'll be a dancer again.
Or rather, I left it physically, but it followed me. I watched my friends perform at their local Nutcrackers and I really wanted to go back--I took about two open classes in five years and that was the best of my efforts.
When I was eighteen, I went to college and the spring of my freshman year, something happened to my back. I am still unsure what it was, but I was unable to move and I needed to leave the door open so that my roommates could communicate with me. As I recovered and finished the semester, I wrote one sentence in my journal:
"I want to be a dancer again."
I didn't think much of that sentence, but I just knew I had no stamina and my back was killing me. I started attending open classes at the Washington Ballet and did Pilates, but that was mostly it.
The next spring, three students in my dorm passed away suddenly, almost within a week of each other, and my roommates and I essentially realized that life is short and we couldn't just sit around and let it pass.
I started taking classes at Joy of Motion DC and through the George Washington University, before living in France for a year and training at La Perverie High School, L'Universite de Nantes, and Elephant Paname in Paris with three amazing teachers.
After returning to the States, during my senior year of college I took seven classes a week at Maryland Youth Ballet, modern dance twice a week through GWU, and Bikram yoga four times a week at a studio in Dupont.
I trained for a year at the Joffrey Ballet School in New York full time, spent a year as a trainee with State Street Ballet of Santa Barbara, and am now a conservatory student at A&A Ballet of Chicago.
It's a lot of work. Dancers will tell you that all the time, and these are the incredibly dedicated dancers who have been training their whole lives. I, on the other hand, am playing catch up. While I will probably never join a professional state ballet company, I do know that my dream is to dance professionally.
I will be able to write policy and international memos forever, but my body will only be capable of ballet for so long. So I decide that I'll be a dancer again.
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