My Year (or two) of Rest and Relaxation

Hello dancers! Long time no see. The COVID 19 pandemic has affected us all in different ways and I’m sure each of you reading this has plans that were changed, put on hold, or maybe even completely cancelled because of it.

In the spring of 2020 my ballet school closed it’s physical location and moved on to hosting online classes. The switch was a difficult one for me. Our studio facility was lovely and I missed it, but I also had trouble adjusting to the unique challenges of taking classes in my living room alone. After a few days I notified my teachers by email that I would be taking a break since the virtual learning format wasn’t suiting me. This was around March of 2020, and I was under the impression that after two weeks or so of lockdown we would be back to business as usual in the studio.

Months passed and the lockdown continued. There were other ballet schools in my area, but I didn't want to audition for any of them. I believed then and still believe now that my ballet school was the best in our city, maybe even the whole state. I decided that I’d rather wait a little longer to go back to the studio I loved dearly than jump back in to practice somewhere else.

After months of lockdown and online school, I breifly moved to Switzerland to attend boarding school. I really enjoyed my time there and even had a few private ballet lessons! When I came back to the USA in July 2021 the lockdown restrictions were much more relaxed than they had been when I left. I texted the artistic director of my ballet school as soon as I was able to, thinking that the school would be reopening soon and I’d be able to return to my old life. I was heartbroken to learn that we’d lost our school building during the pandemic. My old ballet school, the one I’d been attending for years at that point, was closed for good. I reached out to another school in my area about classes, but the time commitment was too much and I never went in for auditions.

There is a bright side to all of this. I’m still doing rhythmic gymnastics and I’ve signed up for my gym’s Xcel competition team again! I’ve been able to go to lessons regularly and I’ve been seeing a lot of improvements in a relatively short amount of time. I’m excited about being able to compete soon, my first competition was supposed to be in April of 2020, but better late than never!

Reflecting on all of this I definitely have things that I wish I’d done differently. If you’d asked me in 2019 I would have said that I wanted to be a professional ballerina more than I wanted anything else, but my actions weren't matching my words. Did I really want to be a pro ballet dancer more than anything? More than I wanted to stay up all night watching YouTube and sleeping during the day? More than I wanted to stay in my comfort zone? More than I wanted to have free time for other activities? These are questions I’d never had to ask myself before, but my actions during the pandemic answered them for me.

Despite the challenges of the pandemic there were still things I could have done differently. I could have stuck with the virtual classes, even though they were difficult. I could have continued to stretch every day. I could have signed up for private lessons sooner and stayed consistent with them. At the end of the day hindsight is 20/20. I could agonize for hours over all of the things I wish I’d done differently, but I’d rather spend that time and energy planning for the things I can do now and in the future instead. I’m so excited to share with you all what I’m up to this month, to release posts that have been sitting in my blog drafts for years now, and to grow and adapt to each of the twists and turns life throws at me in the future.