Dancing — 20 years is a long time

Twenty years is a long time for anything.

Well, this spring marks twenty years of serious dance training for me. (And also twenty years of ballet training specifically.)  Wow.  Allllllllll the way back to when I was three and a half years old...

Awww.

Now, on a somewhat-side note...  I always specify that I've been training, not just dancing, for said amount of years.  Because lots of people say they danced for such-and-such time, but what does that really mean?  Well, years of  training, you can measure.  And dedication in training is what makes the difference.

(Also, another note: awesome for you if you "did ballet when you were little"... But that doesn't exactly...count...  :P  And it doesn't make dance (especially ballet) 'easy' and something to brush off, any more than my taking a year of beginning piano a looooooong time ago means I should look down my nose at those of you who've invested years of dedication to pursue excellence in your craft.  So yeah... just remember to give credit where credit is due. ;) Which is why I choose to specify years of training. :)  Anyway...)

Years of training also matters because, from ages six to nine, I wasn't technically in ballet classes at all, so I don't count those.  But I sure was dancing on my own around the house!  For nearly all my life, the arrangement of living room furniture in our house had one requirement; leave space for dancing dramatically.  (usually to the 'Prince of Egypt' soundtrack...or old records, Nutcracker, and that one Christmas CD I really loved...)

Fiddler On The Roof — I'm Tevye's wife, on the left.

 

A dream come true for me; in the Nutcracker Snowflake Waltz, and my first year on pointe. 

My first year adding Modern dance to my training.  (12 years of Modern this spring - wow!)

2010 graduation solo, 'The Motions'.

Most recently, a solo from 2016, 'Better Than I'    —    And in 2017, getting fit in a new brand of pointe shoes for the first time since getting on pointe 12 years ago. ;) 

In short, here's to twenty-mazillion more years of dancing to come.   'Dance till the stars come down from the rafters.'  (—W.H. Auden)

(Pictures are my own.  No using them elsewhere -- thanks.  :) )