Day 17

Today was a tiring but productive day! I had so much today! We had Pilates in the morning with Laura, our LAST Pilates class! It was very sad, but I felt SO much stronger by the end of it. Then we had ZUMBA again with Chris. His Zumba class is really good. I took Zumba at Ailey last summer and it was a good class, but not as fun and clear as Chris'. He is very good at keeping the momentum and energy up while directing us in a way for us to be able to adjust to his movements quickly. It is such a fun class! I heard people are on a wait-list for his class, no wonder!

Then we had Jazz class with Jojo and he taught a combination that was made to the song Who you are by Jessie J. I related to it in so many ways. It was a little hectic learning the piece at first, but I really connected with the words as well as the emotional response of the movement to the music. We ended up running 10 minutes late to do that combo again! I literally fell in love with it. I would have rather skipped lunch to keep doing that combo. Jojo also made a really good point in the class. He said, "Dance is a short-lived career, you don't have enough time, so be ferocious." Everyone has been telling me just to go after and attack everything with all that I have. I feel as though I have always been persistent in trying to get everything right in dance, now it's time to just enjoy it. Because, dance eventually dies. You can't have something so beautiful last forever, so enjoy it while you can.

Then we had Repertory with Jeannie where Jacki and I learned the duet from Concerto 622 in fifteen minutes! Everyone else had already knew the combo, but since we missed Repertory the other day we had to learn it right away. When I first attempted to pick up the steps, I was scared! But within a few minutes, I picked it up really quickly! I was shocked at how fast we learned it. I had had thoughts earlier in the day about my ability to pick up combinations, and to be honest I don't think I have bad memory. I think my real problem is that I zone out when it is time to learn a combination. I think a big step I need to take is to be in the moment of dance and to pay closer attention in the learning process of choreography so that I can initiate my body in better positioning from the get-go.

We then moved onto our rehearsal with Jojo which lasted from 4-6:30. We did so much running back and forth, I felt as though I ran 3 miles! It was super crazy! Jojo changed the choreography again, but I finally feel pretty secure with the majority of the dance. At first I was a little concerned because I thought the only thing I would be doing would be to arrange the curtains, but I did get assigned a lot more choreography today. The piece feels more confident and it feels like it is coming along better than others are anticipating. I just hope that it all works out and we blow people away with our performance.

I feel as though I have developed a lot of bad habits in my dancing that I want to fix. Looking at all the dancers here intimidates me, but also informs me. I feel as though I have a long way to go to push to a higher level, but that overall I am grasping some concepts a lot better. I think for now I just need to work on developing better habits as well as keeping up with my strengthening conditioning. Sometimes I feel so discouraged for a period of time and feel as though all my work is a waste, but then I have days like today where I discover my joy of dance all over again through simple combinations, classes, rehearsals...and my reasoning for being in this profession/field all becomes clear again.