Fall 2013: I took a magazine feature writing class, taught by Pulitzer Prize-winning feature writer Julia Keller, a visiting professional at the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. Though we only had two long-term writing projects, I learned about myself as a writer and as a reader of feature writing. The story below, a profile piece on my younger sister, who is on her way to becoming a professional dancer, was my midterm project.
BALANCING ACT
Leah Hiller flies down the stairs, water bottle in hand, and sprints through the open front door. Her hair hasn’t been brushed since before school this morning, and her shoes are completely inappropriate for the crisp autumn weather, but it doesn’t matter. She piles bags and shoes at her feet in the front seat of the car, slams the door behind her and immediately pulls down the passenger side visor to use the mirror.
Backing out of the driveway seems to take an eternity. It is 4:01 p.m., but we’re one minute later than usual, which is a whole 60 seconds.
“Drive! We’re late!”
As I roll through stop signs and miss red lights by a fraction of a second, Leah twists and pins her hair into a tight bun then engulfs the inside of the car with industrial-strength hairspray.
We stop for a moment to pick up one of her friends, and then we’re off – speeding down Broad St. hoping not to get a ticket, because now we’re running two minutes late and stopping is not an option.
***
They sit in groups of three or four, scattered across the room. At least four of them are comfortably lounging in the splits. Conversations range from silly to serious – “Who was eliminated on So You Think You Can Dance?” “Where did you get that new leotard?” “Did you like Swan Lake?” “I wish we could just not do school and go to company rehearsal instead!” They seem like normal teenage girls, gossiping about TV shows and complaining about school. Then Stefani Crea, a Columbus Dance Theatre Company Member, stands up.
“We’ll start in first position today.”
A rhythmic piano piece resonates through the speakers. The girls stand up and face either side of the barre, then begin the first in an hour-long series of combinations. The smiles and laughter that permeated warm ups are replaced with focus and determination as the girls make bending over backward and contorting into unusual positions look completely natural and painless.
***
Many people think of dancers as stick-thin girls with buns, hairspray and pointe shoes. My 14-year-old sister fits this stereotype almost exactly, but the body types of the rest of the dancers in this class vary as much as the patterns of fabric on the back of their leotards. In the studio today are girls with normal-sized breasts, girls who should have gone through puberty at least two years ago, girls with thigh gaps, and girls who have muscles in places where I didn’t think muscles could exist. They are all beautiful and every motion they make is fluid.
“Raise your leg just a bit,” Stefani instructed.
A dozen legs shot up; ears touched toes. Ouch.
“Bring (your leg) more to the side if it starts to lift up,” Stefani said, referring the girls’ hips. “If your leg is more forward, it will drop and hurt less.”
I don’t think I really appreciated my sister and what she does for this sport until I sat through her Monday afternoon dance class. Dancing is a sport – football may be more popular, but those athletes have nothing on these artists. The twelve girls in Leah’s class spend between 15 and 20 hours dancing at the studio each week, plus practice and often physical therapy outside of rehearsal. My parents buy $80 pointe shoes every two weeks or so, and when performances are coming up, even more time and money is dedicated to dance. Working hard comes naturally to my sister. She wants to do well in school to please our parents and she wants to excel in dance to further her career.
“(The dancers) do want to do well and they don’t want to displease the teacher even though I’m pretty laid back and realistic,” Stefani told me after class. “Why be super tough when you know this is what they want and you know they’re going to work hard for it?”
And work hard they do. Rosa Prigan, a freshman studying dance performance at Butler University, spent about four hours per day training at Ballet Met during her first three years of high school and spent her senior year dancing as a pre-professional. She went to school for about two hours three times per week and did two independent studies, while spending full days and evenings dancing.
“That was the best thing I could have ever done for myself as far as preparation,” she said. “I got so much better that year.”
Now at Butler, she takes both dance and academic courses. Though the workload hasn’t necessarily decreased, she finds it easier to manage her time in college since her schooling and dancing are one in the same.
“The teachers (at Butler) really care about what you want to do with your life,” she said. “They’ll give you the tools to get there.”
***
After an abdominal workout that would probably make a body builder proud, Leah’s class takes a five-minute break to refill water bottles and change into pointe shoes. Once ribbons are tied, heels and toes are appropriately rosined and more stretching commences, they gather at center stage to learn the first combination of the next set.
Stefani’s body speaks dance. A lot of the verbal jargon is actually French, but even as she mimes the motions of the next combination, I can’t remember the last move she made. Eight counts later, the 12 to 17-year old girls are turning minimal gestures into graceful ballet as their pointe shoes knock against the floor.
Legs up, legs down. Fouette. Pirouette.
“That really hurt,” Leah mouthed at me between landing a double pirouette on pointe and changing direction to continue the combination.
It was then that I realized my mouth was hanging open. Whether in surprise or sympathetic pain, I’m not quite sure, but I do know that these teenagers just had a better workout in the past half hour than I have had in the past half year. I’m getting dizzy just watching them turn, but I’m completely mesmerized and can’t seem to remove my gaze from the studio floor.
***
After rehearsal, Leah and I had dinner at a local pizza shop, and when we got home, her meal expanded to include Morning Star chicken nuggets and a baked potato with cheese. Though not the healthiest options, the calories certainly didn’t do any harm. Her Honors World Studies notes, textbook and three piles of flashcards were spread neatly across the table.
“The workload is stressful,” she said. “I don’t enjoy school very much. I really do kind of hate it because I can’t dance all the time.”
Her fork stabbed the empty space next to her baked potato. She looked away from the page of notes she was reviewing to readjust her aim, then shifted her gaze back to the notebook. Under the table, her feet were moving as if practicing her part in the upcoming winter performance of The Little Matchgirl.
“What’s a social life?” she asked jokingly between bites as I kept interrupting her studying. “I didn’t go to the homecoming dance. I went to see Swan Lake.”
It’s not just Leah—many other dancers also experience the stress of being a teenager while also trying to jump-start a career.
“I gave up some of the norms of being a teenager,” Rosa said into her computer’s webcam. We were Skyping. She was sewing pointe shoes as she talked. “I gave things up but I never sacrificed anything. The difference is that sacrificing means you regret things.”
Dancers all have to prioritize every part of their lives, and sometimes friend and family time doesn’t exist. But most agree it is worth the time, effort and stress.
“(My family) loves to watch me dance and they’re very supporting and everything, but it’s kind of hard to be as a family together when you’re dancing every day after school,” Hannah Dolen, one CDT’s Intensive Training Program members, said. “Even though sometimes I question why I (dance), whenever I go on stage I just love it. There’s something about performing for other people and doing it for yourself…I just love it.”
Hannah and Leah have grown up together, as people and as dancers, and neither can imagine doing anything else.
“If I wasn’t a dancer…”
There was a long pause as Leah considered another career path. A minute of head shakes and quizzical looks toward the ceiling later, she looked me in the eye.
“If I wasn’t a dancer, I’d want to be a dancer.” •
BALANCING ACT
Leah Hiller flies down the stairs, water bottle in hand, and sprints through the open front door. Her hair hasn’t been brushed since before school this morning, and her shoes are completely inappropriate for the crisp autumn weather, but it doesn’t matter. She piles bags and shoes at her feet in the front seat of the car, slams the door behind her and immediately pulls down the passenger side visor to use the mirror.
Backing out of the driveway seems to take an eternity. It is 4:01 p.m., but we’re one minute later than usual, which is a whole 60 seconds.
“Drive! We’re late!”
As I roll through stop signs and miss red lights by a fraction of a second, Leah twists and pins her hair into a tight bun then engulfs the inside of the car with industrial-strength hairspray.
We stop for a moment to pick up one of her friends, and then we’re off – speeding down Broad St. hoping not to get a ticket, because now we’re running two minutes late and stopping is not an option.
***
They sit in groups of three or four, scattered across the room. At least four of them are comfortably lounging in the splits. Conversations range from silly to serious – “Who was eliminated on So You Think You Can Dance?” “Where did you get that new leotard?” “Did you like Swan Lake?” “I wish we could just not do school and go to company rehearsal instead!” They seem like normal teenage girls, gossiping about TV shows and complaining about school. Then Stefani Crea, a Columbus Dance Theatre Company Member, stands up.
“We’ll start in first position today.”
A rhythmic piano piece resonates through the speakers. The girls stand up and face either side of the barre, then begin the first in an hour-long series of combinations. The smiles and laughter that permeated warm ups are replaced with focus and determination as the girls make bending over backward and contorting into unusual positions look completely natural and painless.
***
Many people think of dancers as stick-thin girls with buns, hairspray and pointe shoes. My 14-year-old sister fits this stereotype almost exactly, but the body types of the rest of the dancers in this class vary as much as the patterns of fabric on the back of their leotards. In the studio today are girls with normal-sized breasts, girls who should have gone through puberty at least two years ago, girls with thigh gaps, and girls who have muscles in places where I didn’t think muscles could exist. They are all beautiful and every motion they make is fluid.
“Raise your leg just a bit,” Stefani instructed.
A dozen legs shot up; ears touched toes. Ouch.
“Bring (your leg) more to the side if it starts to lift up,” Stefani said, referring the girls’ hips. “If your leg is more forward, it will drop and hurt less.”
I don’t think I really appreciated my sister and what she does for this sport until I sat through her Monday afternoon dance class. Dancing is a sport – football may be more popular, but those athletes have nothing on these artists. The twelve girls in Leah’s class spend between 15 and 20 hours dancing at the studio each week, plus practice and often physical therapy outside of rehearsal. My parents buy $80 pointe shoes every two weeks or so, and when performances are coming up, even more time and money is dedicated to dance. Working hard comes naturally to my sister. She wants to do well in school to please our parents and she wants to excel in dance to further her career.
“(The dancers) do want to do well and they don’t want to displease the teacher even though I’m pretty laid back and realistic,” Stefani told me after class. “Why be super tough when you know this is what they want and you know they’re going to work hard for it?”
And work hard they do. Rosa Prigan, a freshman studying dance performance at Butler University, spent about four hours per day training at Ballet Met during her first three years of high school and spent her senior year dancing as a pre-professional. She went to school for about two hours three times per week and did two independent studies, while spending full days and evenings dancing.
“That was the best thing I could have ever done for myself as far as preparation,” she said. “I got so much better that year.”
Now at Butler, she takes both dance and academic courses. Though the workload hasn’t necessarily decreased, she finds it easier to manage her time in college since her schooling and dancing are one in the same.
“The teachers (at Butler) really care about what you want to do with your life,” she said. “They’ll give you the tools to get there.”
***
After an abdominal workout that would probably make a body builder proud, Leah’s class takes a five-minute break to refill water bottles and change into pointe shoes. Once ribbons are tied, heels and toes are appropriately rosined and more stretching commences, they gather at center stage to learn the first combination of the next set.
Stefani’s body speaks dance. A lot of the verbal jargon is actually French, but even as she mimes the motions of the next combination, I can’t remember the last move she made. Eight counts later, the 12 to 17-year old girls are turning minimal gestures into graceful ballet as their pointe shoes knock against the floor.
Legs up, legs down. Fouette. Pirouette.
“That really hurt,” Leah mouthed at me between landing a double pirouette on pointe and changing direction to continue the combination.
It was then that I realized my mouth was hanging open. Whether in surprise or sympathetic pain, I’m not quite sure, but I do know that these teenagers just had a better workout in the past half hour than I have had in the past half year. I’m getting dizzy just watching them turn, but I’m completely mesmerized and can’t seem to remove my gaze from the studio floor.
***
After rehearsal, Leah and I had dinner at a local pizza shop, and when we got home, her meal expanded to include Morning Star chicken nuggets and a baked potato with cheese. Though not the healthiest options, the calories certainly didn’t do any harm. Her Honors World Studies notes, textbook and three piles of flashcards were spread neatly across the table.
“The workload is stressful,” she said. “I don’t enjoy school very much. I really do kind of hate it because I can’t dance all the time.”
Her fork stabbed the empty space next to her baked potato. She looked away from the page of notes she was reviewing to readjust her aim, then shifted her gaze back to the notebook. Under the table, her feet were moving as if practicing her part in the upcoming winter performance of The Little Matchgirl.
“What’s a social life?” she asked jokingly between bites as I kept interrupting her studying. “I didn’t go to the homecoming dance. I went to see Swan Lake.”
It’s not just Leah—many other dancers also experience the stress of being a teenager while also trying to jump-start a career.
“I gave up some of the norms of being a teenager,” Rosa said into her computer’s webcam. We were Skyping. She was sewing pointe shoes as she talked. “I gave things up but I never sacrificed anything. The difference is that sacrificing means you regret things.”
Dancers all have to prioritize every part of their lives, and sometimes friend and family time doesn’t exist. But most agree it is worth the time, effort and stress.
“(My family) loves to watch me dance and they’re very supporting and everything, but it’s kind of hard to be as a family together when you’re dancing every day after school,” Hannah Dolen, one CDT’s Intensive Training Program members, said. “Even though sometimes I question why I (dance), whenever I go on stage I just love it. There’s something about performing for other people and doing it for yourself…I just love it.”
Hannah and Leah have grown up together, as people and as dancers, and neither can imagine doing anything else.
“If I wasn’t a dancer…”
There was a long pause as Leah considered another career path. A minute of head shakes and quizzical looks toward the ceiling later, she looked me in the eye.
“If I wasn’t a dancer, I’d want to be a dancer.” •