To Observe, To Learn, To Grow, To Love

 Someone asked me, "Do you do anything else during Recital Week?"  The answer is no, I realized, which is what makes this week so relaxing and sweet.  Even given this fact, the kids were pretty tired by Saturday.  All of them were in both casts, except Ptolemy, who was only in one staging, one dress rehearsal and one performance.  I am so happy the rest of them all got to be in both casts.  It's sad when one kid is left out of half of the festivities.  This year was perfect.  On Saturday, after the matinee, the whole family gathered outside the Browning Center.  We had three or so hours before call time for the evening performance.  I said to Scott, "It's so nice that we have nothing to do.  Like, we have three hours and we can do whatever we want.  All we have to do is get pizza."  Scott was looking at me like I was nuts.  Nothing to do?  Uh-huh.  But seriously.  When does the whole family have three solid hours together to do nothing?  Recital Week.  So we got pizza and did this:

Yeah, I'm good with three hours of aimless free time every few months.  Any more than that is just tiring.

 After Scott went home with Tizzy, we still had time to go to the dollar store, then lounge about the halls waiting for warm-up class to start.  Then, finally, curtain time again!  Hundreds of kids, bleeding, crying, feeling sick, getting lost, tearing their tights, misplacing their costumes, being dropped off for the wrong recital.  You know, all the stuff that I love.  Honestly, it beats feeding ducks, although it was nice to stretch out on the grass for awhile.

 Ari

 Esmae

 Freestone insisted on lots of hairspray for his hair, which had nowhere to go, and was perfectly well-behaved without any product at all.  I guess he felt more prepared with his hair paralyzed.  This is his modern costume.  He has threatened to wear those suspenders as a civilian, so that will be interesting.

Modern costume.  Cool dance.

Vulcan neck pinch, otherwise known as a trapezius, Bill's main form of discipline for the past 40 years.

Don't tell him, but it doesn't really hurt.

The Rubies, Golda, Emily and Jess

Ari in Les Sylphides costume

 My Wednesday-Saturday 5:00 class.  Darling girls!

 Emma and Ari, carpool buddies.  I eschew carpools whenever possible because I go ballistic when my kids are late for things, or even when they MIGHT be, but the Whites are close and reliable, and saved me by driving Ari when I was teaching.

 Freestone and Xanthe were in the same modern class.  Their percussion dance was cool.

 Ruby and Nancy, one of her little guitar students, backstage.

 Christie's Advanced II class, some of them.

 Meanwhile, Tziporah was having fun with Scott, being a spoiled only child!

 She found my chocolate-covered almonds hiding under my bed and told Scott, "I'm eating dog poop!"  Lol.  I had told the kids that the almonds were reindeer poop.  Why?  I don't know.  So they wouldn't seem so appetizing and I could hog them all up myself?  :)

 "Liby from Shelter" is this darling girl's official name in Ptolemy's book.  He also has "my best friend Camden" and "the real Isaac" that he calls buddies.  Liby from Shelter was one of the many girls who swarmed around Ptolemy.  Unfortunately for the little girls, Tolly only had eyes for his pre-teen chaperones and the lovely and graceful Lauren, the senior soloist in his dance.  Look at him admiring her onstage!

Ptolemy was only in the matinee, since he is so little.  He stayed for the Saturday evening performance, to watch the magician.  I stuck him in the class that Ari was chaperoning and went backstage to watch the kids dance.  Later, suddenly, Ptolemy was right there backstage, like an apparition.  I had this panicked thought that he had walked across the stage to get to me.  I said, "How did you get here?!"  He bounced up and down and chirped, "I came with the rainbow class."  Ari's class, "Mosquitos," had colorful costumes which apparently disguised Ptolemy as he sneaked backstage and found his mom, like a sequined homing pigeon.  He knows his way around!

It was fun to be backstage when the curtain went down, with all the seniors, their friends and Clytie, exchanging final hugs.  Senior moms filtered back for photo ops, and there were tears on both sides of the cameras.  For this photo of Clytie, the conductor David Van Alstyne, and the Company girls, I wrote a quote from Maya Angelou, "We are all visitors to this time, this place.  We are just passing through.  Our purpose here is to observe, to learn, to grow, to love...and then we return home."

Concise and beautifully true.  There it is.  And I thank Clytie for giving all of us the opportunity to experience all of those things.  Through dance, as through life, we observe, learn, grow and love.  This picture captures the observing, by the Company girls onstage as well as the younger girls in the wings.  They are learning as they observe, and as they do and imitate.  They are growing.  Even Clytie and David are growing in their roles, as they bring dance and music to the audience.  And the love, well, that is evident in abundance, through performance, through the gratitude of the dancers toward their teachers, and through the tears as final bows are taken, final hugs exchanged.  And now we move on to the next thing, to observe, learn, grow and love, enriched by our experience here.

It's Sunday afternoon, and Tziporah just said to me, "Mommy, it's time a go!  We needa go to a be-cital!"  No, little one, not until next year.  We have other things to observe, other ways to learn and grow, other aspects of life to love.