Last year, at the end of the weeklong celebration of Purim, my older daughter declared that she would like to dress up as a character from Disney’s Descendants next year. For the other days, Famous Day, Pajama Day, Countries Day, we made a plan a week in advance. We knew exactly what she wanted to dress up as on each day. The night before the first dress-up day, we tried on her Frida Kahlo costume (which was gorgeous I must admit). She looked at herself in the mirror, beaming.
The next morning, as she was going to get dressed she said,
“I don’t want to dress up.”Read more
This memory guides me to the very first dance studio I ever saw. It had a name: Sala Rossa. It was a bright red box of a room with golden barres and pictures of famous ballerinas hanging on the walls. All very anxiety-inducing for my likes. I’m surrounded by slim, beautiful girls walking like elegant cats, holding onto the barre for balance in ways that seem effortless to me.Read more
Dear Balloons,
thank you for reminding me
to stay plenty empty
available for space
and new possibilities.Read more
One of the things I love most about dance is the way it distorts my perception of time. On stage, time is stretched far beyond its usual limits. There is time for everything, for thinking, feeling, moving, connected, making decisions and renewal. A short piece can encapsulate an entire world if approached correctly. In his book Blink, Malcolm Gladwell writes of this phenomenon regarding athletes.
“The basketball superstar Larry Bird used to say at a critical moments in the game, the court would go quiet and the players would seem to be moving in slow motion.”Read more
I remember the way the chair felt and that feeling…. that feeling of seeing something that would change me. It was not just that the piece was excellent. It was that first-time sensation…. the first time when something on stage punched me in the guts…the first time I saw a show that depicted real people exploring everyday social issues not just making pretty shapes. I knew it was choreographed and practiced but, for me, it was happening in real time. It was everything that I could imagine and more. I was in high school and we were told to take notes but no notes could describe what I felt so my page was left empty.Read more
You are a dance style
with a name that sounds like destruction, but you only destroy obstacles and fears.
You are an art form contradicting limits and always inspiring to go for more.
I think I love you for many things. But I really appreciate that you always accept
me the way I am and push me to leave the comfort zone. Well, over the past 3 years,
that comfort zone never found me. And it is a gift.Read more
I think the major opinion about returning to work as a dancer after maternity leave is that we become less hireable and that our bodies change for the worse. A big question employers ask is “how will these mother/dancers ever manage a tour life with children”? I understand these worries and to say I never had them would be lying. But how are we supposed to overcome certain beliefs if we believe them ourselves?Read more
Dance, I need you to know you are my one and only, and
I will keep trying. If you could only see how much I love you, I know you’d love me back. I
want you to be devoted to me, like how I am devoted to you. I don’t want to be your side piece
anymore. I think I deserve more.Read more
As a parent, and as a choreographer, these are some of the hardest moments. They are situations that require creativity, calm, patience and endurance. It is not easy to prize someone free of a complaint spiral, sometimes it’s nearly impossible. But, for me and my child, being able to identify that we are in one is somehow useful. And knowing that there is an end to it, that it will eventually resolve, provides the encouragement I, at least, need to get through.Read more
It is impossible to divorce the emotional strain of bringing a child into the world from the physical effort. They are two sides of an intense, forty-week-long journey and they are both valid, legitimate and real elements of it. Doctors and healthcare providers need to broaden their approach to pregnancy and the care given to women needs a more holistic perspective on mind and body.Read more