Passion

Anatomy of a                dancer

– Jessica Bondreaux

A dancer’s heart beats in eight-count

A dancer’s eyes always shine

A dancer’s soul is filled with music

So their feet always fall in time

A dancer feels like no other

The vibrant rthythm of life

And it all goes into the performance

All the joy and all the strife

So remember that with dancers

A little patience is what you need

Because their minds are otherwise engaged

Dancers are truly a different breed

This poem is so relatable to a dancer! I can just feel everything the author says. I’m like, “Yes! I can feel my heart beat the same way! We always dance in eight-counts. My soul swirls and floats along with the music when I dance, it is filled with it! I feel like no other! I feel love and life and bliss and wonder all at the same time.” All of our time, energy, and feeling goes into our performance, and we wait patiently to reach those “one-day I will” goals.

We, as dancers, are different people than everyone else because we really feel the music, and experience a passion no other person has experienced before. We pour both body and soul into the melody, and this refreshes ourselves.

This poem connects to all of that.

There is a quote, “Dance allows you to find yourself and lose yourself at the same time.” This links to my feeling about dance and also to this poem.

In dance, you can just get lost inside the music, but you can also find a part of yourself you never knew you had, hidden, locked away. In the depths of your heart. That part of you is called Your Passion.

Beautiful Concentration
Creative Commons License Photo Credit: Patrick McDonald via Compfight
Creative Commons License Photo Credit: dancer Dallagio via Compfight

Fluff and Ruffle

Little kids sometimes dress really embarrassingly. They could wear a shower cap to school paired with a neon sweater vest and glitter leggings. They could dress up in a fairy costume – wings included and wear that to school. They could end up with a pair of your college brother’s old race-car underwear doubling as a hat! But sometimes they can dress up really cute! An old favorite is the mini tutu.

Tutus are adorable on toddlers! First of all, they are fluffy. I love a good poofy skirt on a baby. The fluffiness can only go so far though. I mean, you can’t go around in something that looks like a ballet costume with a pancake for a skirt! Ruffles and lace are good material for tutus. They accentuate that fluffiness. Tulle and satin create a sweet, innocent presence and if you can pull off that charming cupcake look then tutus are right for you!

Another thing about tutus is that they pair with simpler items so you don’t go over-the-top-80’s-party-crazy. You can wear them with a plain colored top with simple sleeves and no pattern. I used to have this really cute dress that had a tutu style skirt. It was a marble pink with salmon satin ruffles. Soooooo cute for a little kid.

Tutus can be like a skirt, or an accessory. They are versatile and cute. Hey not the hottest style but it works!

Lastly, they come in a bunch of different styles. Like you can get a flatter tutu, or a poofy one. A layered one, or a one ruffle skirt. A dress, skirt, costume so be it. They come in tons of colors and materials too. The best are light pink, slightly poofy and slightly flat, with lace overlay.

I wouldn’t pick a tutu for me, but for a baby or something then why not? Little kids are less fashion obsessed anyway. Plus I can always just pick a tutu for a costume or dress up day thing at school. Tutus are like the most versatile skirts and the most sweet cupcake type! Tutus are ADORABLE!

Mansion

A large foot comes stomping down on my own little feet. The delicate flats now have a dark, dusty footprint stained on the purple suede. I whip my head around to glare at the rude person who ruined my new ballet flats but when I already have my mean face painted on, and I have turned to see them… They’re gone. I sigh and lean down to brush off the mark. Just as my fingertips have touched the suede, another person–no, boulder, comes knocking into my shoulder. The force sends me toppling over, and with identical dirty spots on my brand-new jeans. I shoot up from the musty old floor, prepared to explode in the person’s face. My blood is boiling over–my head is bubbling with flame–my face is bursting with fresh rage. I quickly locate my target and I start to storm towards them, creating rough clouds of dust behind me when BLAM! One, two, three men come hurtling in my direction. I shriek just as one crashes into my side, the next shoves me aside sharply against the left shoulder, and the third… He elbows me in the ribs and I’m left behind, gasping for air, like a fish out of water, in a clutter of people and a wispy swirl of dust. I desperately cough and claw at the ground, my voice is a ragged rasp, hacking and coughing hideously. Finally I let out one last harsh cough and stand up.

Dad thumps me on the back, “you okay girl?” He asks.
“Floating to heaven on cloud nine.” I grouch sarcastically.
“Then you’re just perfect!” Dad jokes. I just slap my palm to my forehead and wince. Ouch. Got a bruise or two… Or three… The crowd that has gathered begins to gradually trickle away, leaving me, my family, my pain, and my misery. I grumble and dust off my clothes and shove my hands into my pockets, only I realized to late that the pockets in my jeans are fake, and end up scratching myself on a button instead. Mom is gaping at my clothes and she immediately come racing up to brush me off. I have a very thorough pat down session that goes on for three minutes, with an extremely embarrassing scene of having your mom dust off the seat of your jeans.
“Moooooom!” I whine through gritted teeth, “People are staring again!”
“Well I won’t have my daughter walk through Spain looking like a hobo.” Mom snaps.
“Half the people here ARE hobos!” I spat back gruffly.
Mom just continues on, the rest of my family trailing behind her like a mother duck and her ducklings.

I’m the last in the line.

We arrive at a fancy market: there are a bunch of huge food and candy sections. The four of us kids zip eagerly up to the candy stand, our eyes already feasting hungrily on the colorful piles of treats that we will soon be filling our tummies with. My eyes locate my favorite sweets in a spilt second. Mom allows us to select a few goodies and drop them in a bag. The cashier rings us up. He is chubby and he looks grumpy, like he didn’t get enough sleep last night. I quickly snatch the candy from him, so I don’t have to touch his squishy-looking sweaty hand. “Gracias.” He mumbles. I gaze around the room. In every spot–every corner, there is some kind of delicious food stand. The seafood, the meat, the fruit, the sweets, the smoothie station, it’s all gloriously beautiful. It’s like a food mansion, a food palace here. I flip my head around every which way, trying to thirstily drink in all the sights. There is one particularly odd stand, you could even say gross. It sold every single cow product you could imagine, the heart, the stomach, the head, the liver, even the cows BLOOD, made into coagulated blood cubes. I pretended to gag at the sight of it, my sister giggled.
“Why would anybody want to eat cow-blood? Does it taste good?” I snickered.
“No way! That stuff probably tastes disgusting!” My dad shouted with a laugh.
“Then why would people want it?” I snorted.
“Maybe it’s good to bathe in it!” My older brother chuckled.
“Ewwwwww!” I shrieked, “Ewwwww! We have enough blood on the inside! We don’t need it on the outside!”
“No kids, people eat it ’cause it’s healthy, they probably totally hate it though!” Dad guffawed. Mom joined the laughter and so did the younger kids. We were all chortling uncontrollably after that. What was in the beginning, a bad day, turned into a hilarious memorable one after that! I’m still gagging and giggling now!

Firsts

There’s always a first time for everything. Your first words, your first steps, your first breath of life. Firsts are special, like yesterday was my birthday, and I got my very first camera.

On that camera. I took my very first picture.

That picture was special.

It was of one of my birthday cards. A beautiful card, with swirly, pearlescent blue writing that read, “Fancytastic.”
I know, I know, fancytastic isn’t a real word, but they were creative enough to make it up. That’s what made it special.

Or maybe it was because the card was decorated with jewels of turquoise, sea green, and deep purple. The card was silver and sparkly, and kind of fancy for a teen. But, I loved it very much.

Though I loved the picture even more.

Because that picture was a first.

My very first picture on my very first camera. I snapped off a few more, a second. A third.

The camera is silver and shines like crystal ice. The pictures are sharp, bright, filling like water in a clear glass. You can see the water splashing around, spilling glittering droplets that swish against the cool glass and slide down, still shimmering. In the pictures, you see the people, the plants, the animals, the light, the life filling the little square with memory. Some of the people spill out, then duck quickly back in. The light beams against the smooth surfaces of the tables and furniture, creating a gleam, a glare.

I kept only that one picture because it was so simple. You could only see the sparkle of the card, the gleam of the lettering, the glittering of the jewels. Then you saw a rough carpet behind it, the color of pale peaches. That brings the attention to the beauty of…

The picture.

The moment.

The first.

Have you had a favorite first?

Baby Birthday

Soon I will be going to my baby cousin’s very first birthday party!
Most little children have parties where the baby is dressed in pale colors, the house is decorated with Elmo or something, and the food includes a big bowl of juicy, grated carrots.

But if you go to a teenager’s party…
Well, that’s a whole different story.

There, the special kid will wear a brand new outfit or something (usually girls), they go somewhere and do something and have like, a sleepover, and the food includes things like pizza, and grilled items and they could have lots of candy and cake.

My birthday party last year was supercool. I had facials and a movie, the house had streamers and sparkly door hangings. We had pizza for dinner, and doughnuts and chocolate as sweets. We watched Freaky Friday, the one with Lindsey Lohan. I had some friends sleepover and in the morning it was a buffet breakfast! There were waffles, fruit, eggs, bacon, and toppings for the waffles. For party favors I bought necklaces, each one picked out especially for one person. There were chocolate truffles with white frosting and sprinkles. A cherry topped it off. “Funfetti” was the flavor. My friends and I all had a blast! We pretended that we wouldn’t see each other in forever when it was time for them to leave.

I went to another baby cousin’s birthday party. He turned two. He had a party in his house and on the lawn. Food included little hot dogs and cooked vegetables. The desserts were mini frosted cupcakes. Most everybody cooed over the little boy and his brother, then talked for the afternoon. All of the guests with other small children left early, when the kids were sort of getting sleepy and upset. Nap time! Soon the “party” was over. Everybody had been very polite and dressed up. It wasn’t super great as parties go, but still I loved being with the little babies and toddlers. Squeaking out their little sayings that were hilarious and made no sense.

Why are little kids and teenager’s parties different? Why is Elmo babyish to us but when you’re three it’s the best thing ever? Why do our clothing style and haircuts change from toddlers to teens?

Can’t somebody answer these burning questions?

Favorite Jeans

I wrote a story about my favorite jeans a few days ago. It was very short but I think it was good. I described every little detail of the jeans, and more… I had never realized why they were my favorite until I wrote this cute description. I remember I had written something like this; Double stitching, dark streaks across the thighs, and my favorite part, super-soft comfy denim.

Conversation topic

Once, I wrote this really cool story about how much I love dance and what I call the really good dancers, the team girls at my studio. I call them the Melted, because they are so good they just melt into a song and go full out beautiful dancer! The mean, snotty girls are the Winters because they are so, so, so coldhearted! The okay and not-so-good dancers are the Stones because they are sort of stiff and stone like!