For as long as I can remember I have always been a busybody. Anytime music would be playing I was moving to it. https://youtu.be/Xy52SkaUk5E?si=wOyqIKSXyJYKbSEy Coming from a musical household it was natural for me. My dad is a musician and my mother played and listened to a lot of jazz music so it was right for me to be involved with music somehow. Dance has always been a huge part of my identity. It’s the first thing that comes to mind when people ask me “Tell me about yourself.” Dancing has always been so prominent in life that it took over my life in the best way possible. It’s always been all I know. I was taking gymnastics classes before I started taking dance classes and they were fun but it wasn’t I wanted to do. Leaving the parking lot of gymnastics one day, we drove by a dance studio. In the windows, I saw girls dancing and I remember telling my mom I wanted to do that. We went inside to check it out and talked to them about enrollment front desk lady about enrollment. This place was Dk dance productions and is now the place know as my dance home. I started there taking recreational combo classes the basic tap and ballet. Eventually, I started taking more classes like hip-hop and jazz. I was recognized a lot in class and would easily move up. During the recreational years, dance was a fun after-school activity, no more than a hobby, but I loved it so much. I looked forward to it every day and it kept me busy. We would have recitals every summer around my birthday and all my family would come to watch me. Afterward, I would get compliments either on how cute or how good I was.
By sixth grade, I was invited to join Dk’s competitive team. This was truly the start of my dance career. Joining the competitive team showed me different side of dance that opened my eyes. Dance was no longer my “just for fun” or “after school activity”. Dance was now becoming my career. After school I would come straight to the studio and practice for six hours Monday through Thursday . We would spend months preparing for competition season each year. During competition season we would compete the dances we worked on for a panel of judges and received awards based on how good we were. This was always so much fun for me. Even though these were some of the longest weekends of my life, the rush of adrenaline and the feeling of dancing on stage made up for it.
During 2020 where everything came to a very abrupt pause I remember being terrified that the studio would shut down. Of course like everything else, the studio did close and going to dance stopped for me. It was a huge shift and change to what we were not prepared for. Lucky enough with the resources we had, we moved to virtual classes. Daily virtual dance classes werent the same though. I missed being in class laughing with my friends and having that community to be apart of. We eventually came back to in person classes in 2021 which still wasnt the same. We had to dance in our designated squares and had to wear masks. Having to dance in masks had to be one of the hardest things Ive ever done but we pushed through. This was taking place my sophomore year of high school which was definitely my worst. Being out of school for two years really made my mental health decline. School was one of the places where I could flourish. I enjoyed going to class and being in the school environment and being confined in a four wall room with just a computer screen felt like hell for me. Quarantine is also where I started puberty being in this environment during such a pivotal point in my life was really hard. I lost my motivation for school and this made my relationship with my parents bad. Them being the only people in the house with me at the time made being at home even harder than it was before. I would isolate myself to my room most of the time and i would only come out to either use the bathroom or to get food. Dance was my main and only escape during this time. It was the one area in my life that I wasnt terribly failing at or had a bad relationship with. I felt so liberated and free whenever I went to class. I could let out all of my emotions there and it was the one space I could feel like I was actually doing something good and useful with my life. I could forget about everything that was going terrible in my life and focus on what was going good. Eventually things started to get a little better when we were given the option to go back in person the last few weeks of school. Dance was still my sanctuary through all my problems junior and senior year.
Another part of being on the competitive team was attending conventions. This took a little bit longer to love than competitions. At conventions we would take an 90 minute class and learn a combo from a usually acclaimed choreoghrpaher. Conventions were mostly for the experience and insight but most conventions I went had scary atmospheres and it was hard to learn in that kind of an environment. Until about 2021. I went to Hollywood Vibe convention and I felt a shift in myself as a dancer there. It was my first time going to this convention and I was nervous. I stood in the front of the room most of the time and I was noticed in class. I got to try out for scholarship and I made it to call backs. Being recognized in class grew my confidence as a dancer a lot and changed the way I approached dancing. After this experience I started to enjoy conventions a lot more. I soaked up the information and would apply it every time I danced. I was pushing myself and giving 100% all the time payed off! I would usually get called out in class and receive a scholarship of recognition during awards. This is about the time when I realized that this is what I want to do with my life. My senior year I attended KAR dance convention and auditioned to be a KAR protege and I got it. That is what I have been participating in most recently. This is a very opportunity to jumpstart my soon and hopefully professional dance career. This is another outlet to do what I love the most and I love that I get to help other kids express their love and appreciation for dance along the way like I did.
