Mummy…The Breakfast Ballerina.

On Thursday night, I attended my first adult ballet class and absolutely loved it!

The kids were in bed when I arrived home and I had to wait ‘til breakfast to share my unbridled exhilaration and gauge their responses. I knew it was going to be priceless.

After all, Mummies don’t do ballet. They drive taxis!

Being the consummate drama queen and loving a bit of theatre, I arrived at the breakfast table standing in 1^st position. My face was beaming. I was absolutely chuffed. Like magic, the heffalump had metamorphosed into a swan in Swan’s Lake. I was dancing at the Sydney Opera House…albeit in my pyjamas! No ballet bun, the birds were still tweeting in my hair.

Yet, reaching for the stars, I could have been that dainty plastic ballerina turning magically inside my childhood jewellery box. Turning round and round in circles to Love Story, she might have been plastic, but for so many little girls, she was the ultimate ballerina launching a thousand dreams.

“He was not bone and feather but a perfect idea of freedom and flight, limited by nothing at all”
― Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull

So there I am beaming in 1^st position when my daughter pipes up:

“Mummy, did you really look like that?”

“I did,” I replied, feeling like I’d confessed to wearing the Emperor’s New Clothes down the main street. Clearly, I’d broken through quite a few barriers and the look on her face was priceless…a mix of confusion, disbelief and horror. What had I done?

To her credit, she didn’t laugh, giggle or make fun of me, although she was clearly struggling to know quite how and where to file this revelation. It didn’t fit anything she’d ever filed under “Mummy” before.

Miss with dancing Shoes

Miss is ten years old and she’s been dancing since she was three. She’s currently doing ballet, modern and jazz. Dainty and petite, she looks like a dancer and the flame burns in her heart and her feet.

 

Mummy

On the other hand, I’m 5ft 10inches tall, mid-40s, disabled and let’s just say I’m no twinkle toes. I last did ballet back in 1980 when I was her age. That was a sobering 36 years ago and a lot of water’s flowed under (and over) the bridge since then.You could say an entire ocean!

However, rather than being upset by her response, it’s probably a good reflection of just how many barriers I smashed taking on that class. Indeed, I’d totally shattered my daughter’s concept of Me, my capabilities and what it means to be a dancer. Mind you, to be perfectly honest, I’d also amazed myself. I fully expected to spend much of the lesson in a chair. If I could hold my hands properly at the end of the 6 weeks, I’d be stoked. Instead, I’d even attempted the basics of a pirouette.

Mummy & Miss

“Why, Jon, why?” his mother asked. “Why is it so hard to be like the rest of the flock, Jon? Why can’t you leave low flying to the pelicans, the albatross? Why don’t you eat? Son, you’re bone and feathers!” “I don’t mind being bone and feathers mom. I just want to know what I can do in the air and what I can’t, that’s all. I just want to know.”
― Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Being my usual theatrical self, I couldn’t stop at 1^st position. I had to demonstrate a pirouette. Well, I don’t think I managed to turn or quite get my raised leg in the right spot but the intention was there.

“That’s that thing with the eyes,” said my son.

He leaps out of his chair and perfectly demonstrates how you focus on a spot while you’re turning and quickly turn your head around.

Mr at Hip Hop aged about 6.

What THE? How did my gaming son find out about the fine art of pirouettes? I shouldn’t have been surprised. He did a boys’ hip-hop class at the dance school and the kids have watched a few dance shows. My son’s friend is also in Dance Team at the dance school.

Besides, as I said, ballet isn’t just for petite little girls. It’s equally for boys and men and is incredibly athletic. Why shouldn’t he take an interest?

Moreover, boys and men need and deserve to express their creative, emotional sides just as much as girls and women. They shouldn’t be repressed with their wings clipped anymore than I!

“We can lift ourselves out of ignorance, we can find ourselves as creatures of excellence and intelligence and skill.”
― Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull

It’s all very well to talk about equality, acceptance and respect but the rubber needs to hit the road. Ideals must translate into action.

“Instead of our drab slogging forth and back to the fishing boats, there’s reason to live!
We can lift ourselves out of ignorance, we can find ourselves as creatures of excellence and intelligence and skill. We can learn to be free! we can learn to fly!”
― Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull

May we all stretch our wings and learn to fly beyond the confines of our minds!

xx Rowena