Once a dancer always a dancer?

I danced ballet for almost 25 consecutive years.  It's really hard for me to pick any one thing that I am proud of, but I am proud of once being able to call myself a dancer.  I had 2 ballet teachers my whole life.  #1 Mrs. D, Emily Danford.  I learned that I was a dancer through Mrs. D.  #2 Audrey King.  I learned that I sucked as a dancer through Audrey King, but since I was a dancer I had no choice but to work as hard as I could, take as much abuse as any person could handle (or most people would not handle the abuse a dancer willingly takes), and keep working to reach that unattainable goal of being a better dancer.

When you are 4 years old going to dance class is pretty much all about pink tutus and running around with all your friends.  Mrs. D was everything you would picture a ballet teacher would be - she was tall and lithe, and when she walked she looked like she was gliding.  She had chic short black hair, an old record player, a bumper sticker on her car "Shut-up and Dance", and buckets and buckets of kindness and patience.  She worked on me a lot as a little kid, and I took it for granted.  She used to tell me if I just tried I could be so much better...but I didn't try.  I was spoiled and sassy and lazy.  One day when I was about 13 I realized as she walked around the class correcting girls, she would just smile and pass me.  No corrections.  I knew I wasn't doing the exercise well, but she hadn't said so...in fact she hadn't said much to me for weeks.  She had given up.

Something clicked in me.  I didn't want to be passed over.  I wanted to get better, I wanted to be a dancer.

From that day on I stopped goofing off and started working.  I stretched, I pulled, I hurt, I listened, I tried, I fell, I bleed, and I never stopped.  Thankfully Mrs. D saw that I was putting in the effort and she let me back in to her gaze.  Those years at The Hilo School of Ballet were some of the best of my life.  I would not be the stubborn, independent, hard working, strong willed woman I am today if it weren't for Mrs. D.  She would tell us there is no such word as "can't" - she wouldn't accept it.  Somewhere along the way everything I learned about working hard in dance applied to the rest of my life.  You worked until there was nothing left.  Then you pushed that limit back and worked some more.  You didn't stop until you reached perfection, and then you improved upon it.  You weren't just dancing for yourself, or for your audience.  You were dancing for your fellow dancers, and if you didn't give perfection you were tarnishing the hard work they were shouldering as well.

I went off to college excited and scared to start a new dance class.  At an open house at the dance studio I met Audrey King - she was 79 years old, 5'1", all dressed in purple, and with a sweet South African accent.  I was in love.  Classes were 6:15 am 3 times a week...no problem, I wrote her a check on the spot and couldn't wait for classes to start.  I think back to how naive I was.  Throughout the years with Audrey watching dancers come and go I learned her pattern.  She didn't turn on the guns until you got comfortable in her class.  The first two classes were fine, hard, but fine.  Then the gloves came off.  I would leave her class in tears once a week for the 1st year I was with Audrey.  I was a "duck flailing in the wind", a "cow on ice", "deaf", "stupid", "not built for ballet"...that last one might seem especially harsh.  What you need to know is that she got in my face and worked me because she could see that I was a dancer in my heart.  She would stand in front of me glaring into my eyes with her stern blue eyes and all yellow outfit and tell me I had to work harder than everyone because I wasn't built with the natural gift of dance.  It didn't mean I couldn't work for it.  If Audrey didn't yell at you, you might as well just leave the class.  We didn't go to class 3x a week at 6:15am to be complimented and coddled.  We went to get better, and little Audrey King in her all baby blue outfit wasn't going to get you to be a better dancer by going easy on you.

I never left Audrey's classes.  I stuck with her all through college.  There were a dozen times I swore I would never go back, but come 6:15am Monday morning I was dragging myself out of bed wrestling with pink tights and running to class.  She made me a better dancer, she made me have the tolerance and will power of a trained soldier.  I have been able to endure impossible situations throughout my life because Audrey showed me the depths to my strengths.

I am Denise because of dance.  My heart breaks knowing that I may never dance again.  This is something that cancer has taken from me.  But as the days go by, some in pain, some in a haze, some in sadness, I can endure each day because I am a dancer in my heart.  I will keep trying, I will grit my teeth through the hurt and never complain, I will endure because I was taught to fight for what I want.  I haven't been in the writing mood lately because I am deep in the trenches of this fight.  I guess this is the hardest dance I've ever had to learn, and I'm not getting it.  I'm frustrated with myself, frustrated with my body for not cooperating.

I've never met an obstacle that I haven't overcome.  I can handle this.  No such word as "can't".

love,
Denise