The following is my monologue for Capstone. Capstone is what our senior presentations are called at my school. Mine included a nine minute dance followed by this speech which took a little more than forty minutes and then I showed a slide show of some of my photography. All in all it is a seventy minute presentation. Within this presentation we are expected to explore our own personal life journeys especially relating to our art and what our plans are after graduation.
The ground shook and trembled the day of my birth. Chaos erupted and the 1989 World Series was interrupted. All this DID occur but… perhaps it had more to do with the 7.1 Loma Prieta earthquake that hit near San Jose, California where we were living at the time than the small curly headed newborn who had just arrived.
Again. No, like this. Better. Try it again. This was the patient voice of my first dance instructor who also happened to be my mother. We were standing at our ballet barre, which doubled as a china cabinet in our dance studio, more commonly known as our living room. I was currently mastering the fine art of the plie.
Those first dance lessons in our one bedroom apartment in the basement of my grandparent’s house in Lynden, Washington where we moved to a year after I had been born had a greater affect on me than my mother could have ever imagined. It was through learning the basics of this age-old dance form that sparked a love and determination that has lived on through to this very day.
In a sense I was a typical little girl. I enjoyed playing with my stuffed animals and dressing up in flouncy dresses. But deep down I was a tomboy at heart. Where one might find me playing house one minuet, in the next I would be running outside to join my brothers on one of our epic adventures. Which could consist of any of the following; tromping among towering grass fields which were too tall to see above searching for mice or the occasional garner snake out behind our house, catching as many grasshoppers as possible, plucking the wings or legs off other unsuspecting insects, forging trails though blackberry thickets, climbing trees, building forts, having pine cone fights, digging large holes just because, and many, many other exhilarating excursions.
Though I was adventurous and for the most part a fearless child I was also quiet and incredibly shy. I loved daydreaming and was often lost in my own little world. This was simply a place where I could let my thoughts wander freely and tune out the world around me.
When we made the move from San Jose, California to the small dairy town of Lynden, Washington located near the Canadian border we temporarily moved into the cramped one bedroom apartment in my grandparent’s basement while my dad looked for work. The temporary move soon became permanent as my dad never found stable work. My little brother was born less than a year after the move making us a family of seven.
My mom did an incredible job of making the little apartment into a comfortable home. I learned early on the importance of hard work. We survived on the food produced from an enormous garden we planted and worked as well as from the eggs and meat of our near two hundred chickens.
Caring for a garden that large was no easy task and it was up to my mom and the five of us little ones to do most of the work. It took careful planning, long days of planting, endless hours of weeding and watering, harvesting and then preserving a great deal of it to last all year round.
Some of my favorite food we grew were carrots, watermelon, many kinds of squash, peas, zucchini, and my absolute favorite green beans. To say the least I grew to love vegetables at an early age. It was an amazing thing to see our work pay off and eventually enjoy eating the results of that work.
I remember how long it took to harvest our produce but when it came to the green beans I didn’t mind as much being they were my favorite. Every few minuets I recall running over to my mom asking if I could eat one. Every now and then she would smile and nod and I would go tearing back as fast as my small legs would carry my to the row I had been working on. Then I would kneel down carefully searching the plant for the best one, pluck it and head over to the water pump to rinse it off before savoring each bite of its crisp goodness.
Though we had to do without a lot of things my mom made sure to not let the time and memories slip by without carefully documenting them with a great deal of photographs. At times this was just candied shots but my mom also did her own photo shoots of us kids or had pictures done at a studio in town.
Looking back I recall this one time my mom took us all to the park for a photo opp. After setting us all up in the perfect pose and after we herd her say, “say cheese” we would all happily comply with big smiles on our faces. Only when we were expecting her to take the picture she did not. Instead she told us to relax and then asked me to smile again. I did and then she told me to try it again and again and again. You see I was at that adorable age where “smile” meant squint your eyes shut and grin as wide as you can.
No matter what my mom said she still was unable to get me to smile normally for the picture. Asking my oldest brother to watch the rest of the boys my mom took my hand and walked me over to the public restroom. She then picked me up and held me in front of the mirror so she could show me how to smile. After a few tears and numerous tries on my part I figured it out. Then we went back to get the picture.
I have never forgotten my smile lesson and my mom and I have had a good laugh about it throughout the years. I believe this ordeal as well as later helping my mom, who became a professional photographer, greatly benefited me later on when I would seriously take up photography.
Five years after having moved to Washington my dad finally found work… in Portland, Oregon. After a time of him driving the five-hour commute leaving Sunday night and retuning the next Friday night we moved down to the rainy city of Portland, Oregon.
I was now six years old and blessed to be enrolled in my first dance class at a recreation center near where we were living. Due to my early lessons in front of our living room china cabinet I was a bit frustrated with the other girls in my class. They weren’t taking it seriously. Instead of going to the ballet barre to do plies and tandus like the teacher instructed, they were more interested in chasing each other around the room.
My teacher, Miss Rosemary picked up on the fact that I was there to learn all I could. After one of my classes in my second year there, while talking to my mom, Miss Rosemary turned to me and asked if I had the choice between taking another class like the one I had been taking or moving to a more difficult and serious class, which one I would want. I immediately responded that I would want the harder class.
The next year my mom moved me to Oregon Ballet School across town. I stayed there for two years. During my time there I began feeling restless and frustrated with myself and even considered quitting. However, there was something in me that couldn’t give up my dance. I was frustrated because I was having difficulty picking up combinations unlike the other girls. It felt like it took me twice as long as them to get it. I later found out this was likely due to my incredibly bad eyesight. A problem we had not known about at the time.
It was at this ballet school that I had my first recital. I was fairly excited and I had rehearsed our routine enough times to feel confident. As I remember, it went off without any major hitches. The next year’s performance was a slightly different story. I had practiced and practiced but in one of our dances there was this one step that I just didn’t understand. There were about four of us in the dance but by the time we were supposed to go on stage two of the girls weren’t there for some reason. I was so nervous about not knowing the dance well enough that… I just didn’t go on. I remember standing in the wings of the stage watching my friend do the performance all by herself and feeling horrible that I had let her down.
As I mentioned earlier I was a very shy child. This had both consequences and benefits. I was that child who literally hid behind her mother’s skirts. My shyness wasn’t something I fully grew out of until about the age of fourteen. When I was little, no matter where we were whether at church or at the grocery store, I could for the most part always be found by my mom’s side. I was content to listen and observe the adults talk about maters I was not yet concerned with. It gave me a great opportunity to drift off into my own world. A place I never tired of. But as time passed I began to comprehend what the adults discussed. Because of this I enjoyed my spot beside my mom more and more. Soon I would hate to leave when my friends would come drag me off to play. I would always wonder what I was missing out on while I joined my friends in a game of hide and seek.
So why dance? And more importantly- why ballet? This is a question I have asked myself over the years and often for different reasons. But really why would an incredibly shy little girl want to go into something that is ultimately going to at some point and time land her out on a stage in front of a bunch of people who expect you to entertain them… Kind of like what is happening right now. Well I figure that at the time I started I didn’t know about the stage aspect. I still can’t pin down what it is exactly that makes me want to dance but it is something in my core. A God given gift that when I hear music I just want to move.
So back to the other question… “Why ballet?”. After all I was always more of a tomboy and isn’t the first thing you think of when someone says, “ballet” a little girl all dressed up in a pink tutu spinning in circles? Well I wasn’t in it for the pink tutu, a color which I tired of quickly. Even at my young age, what I really loved in this art form was how ridiculously hard it was. Yet, while you did something difficult, a good dancer would make it look effortless. THAT is what I loved, the constant struggle to perfect a move and at the same time not letting the audience in on it.
The next year my mom began teaching dance at a Christian dance studio called Joy of Praise. She asked me if I wanted to continue at the Oregon Ballet School where I was or follow her to Joy of Praise where she was now working. I decided to try Joy of Praise. I loved it. The first year I ended up taking from my mom because she was teaching the level I was going into. All of the sudden I loved being in class. I understood the steps and I was able to pick up the combinations quickly.
The first recital I had with Joy of Praise I was in 7 different dances and I loved being on stage. I was home-schooled at the time so I was often at the dance studio all day long. I would do my studies in between my classes.
That next year Candalee Wrede, our ballet mistress, invited me to join a much more advanced level. I was nervous, but understood that this was an honor, and agreed. The classes were exceedingly more difficult and filled with girls who towered above me. Most of the steps the rest of the girls knew well and I had never even heard of them before but I was determined to do my best to keep up with the older girls. I was normally frustrated with myself and on the brink of tears when I went home every night yet I loved being there.
I continued taking at Joy of Praise for another year before our small studio closed. About this time I began seriously asking myself what I wanted to do with my dance. I wanted to dance professionally but as I learned more abut the professional dance world and the dog eat dog environment I would need to adapt to I was frustrated and disinterested. I didn’t want to make it in the dance world if that meant stepping on others to get there. I danced because I loved the art form not for the applause of the audience. I considered becoming a teacher but what I still really wanted was to dance professionally without compromising who I was, but I couldn’t see how that would happen.
Not long after the studio closed its doors the director treated all the teachers to a ballet performance and my mom brought me along. The company’s name was, Ballet Magnificat. It was a Christian dance company and to be honest I wasn’t all that excited about seeing them perform. I presumed they were a small company and the performance would be mediocre at best. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I spent the entire performance with my jaw dropped in amazement. I had never seen more strong, technically clean, beautiful movement in my life. There was no doubt in my mind. I wanted to dance with Ballet Magnificat.
After the studio closed, I danced under the instruction of a different teacher for awhile but then found out where Candalee was teaching and resumed taking classes from her. A few years later I heard that Ballet Magnificat had a summer dance intensive held in Jackson, Mississippi and I went for a two-week session.
That first year my mom went as well working as a counselor. We arrived in Jackson a few days early because my mom needed to be there early to prepare things for the girls she would be in charge of. We actually arrived a day before she needed to check in. Mississippi is called the hospitality state and immediately we began to see the truth of this.
We were picked up at the air port by the friend of a relative of a friend of ours. He drove us to our friend’s relative’s house who after hearing we would need a place to stay for a night offered their house as well as the use of their car despite the fact they would be out of state at the time and they had never met us.
Having been awake for near twenty-four hours we crashed for a nice long nap but not before carefully placing all of our luggage up off the ground in some way or another in order to avoid the cockroaches we had heard were numerous in the south.
Content we had out witted the critters we slept soundly and then headed into town to perches groceries for diner. Latter that night as I was preparing to hit the sack for the night I heard a blood-curling scream come from the kitchen.
Running quickly to see what had happened I found my mom anxiously pointing at the largest roach I had ever laid eyes on. It was at least as long as my index finger and as thick as my thumb. Now I had never come across a bug that truly scared me until I saw that roach. We both attempted to convince the other to be the one to kill the vermin but ended up simply cowering on the other side of the room watching it make its way across the floor and then swiftly up the wall. At this we looked at each other in shock as the realization that what we had earlier thought was a cleaver move by placing our luggage up off the ground was futile.
I literally cried a little as I took a shower that night before heading to bed. All I wanted was to get on a plane and be home before morning. I had had enough of this humid, sticky, hot, roach infested land and I hadn't even been there for twenty-four hours. I couldn’t imagine being stuck there for the next two weeks. What I wouldn’t have given for a nice deep breath of clean fresh Portland air.
The next morning things looked much brighter. We went and checked in at Belhaven College where we were going to be staying during the intensive. Students were checking in the next day so I stayed in my mom's room that night. We had more roach adventures that night and got very little sleep partially due to the fact we left the lights on all night because the cockroaches tend to stay away from light.
The two-week intensive flew by faster than I could believe. Just about everything was incredible… excepting the roaches of course. I loved the Christian environment and the attitude of my fellow dancers. Instead of the typical vicious, competitive mentality dancers tend to have there was a genuine respect and appreciation for each other. If one dancer was injured instead of being glad to have one less person to compete with we were bummed out for them and there was always someone at any point and time ready to help them out with anything from carrying their bag to helping them learn and remember choreography if they had to miss a class or anything else they needed. Members of the company taught the classes and we would often have different teachers, which was a great opportunity to be challenged in various areas.
I was shocked to find that I actually missed Mississippi after I returned to the beautiful northwest. It wasn’t just the ability to do nothing but dance all day for two weeks that I missed but … everything. The smell of morning dew on our way to the cafeteria, the amazing Mississippi thunderstorms, the sound of a vast orchestra of bugs singing all night long, the ability to stand out in a downpour of rain and be warm, I even missed the cafeteria food, but most of all I missed the people I had come to know and love.
The next year I went back by myself for four weeks. I left Portland early in the morning and made it to my dorm a few minutes after seven in the evening. I was exhausted from traveling all day. In addition, the night before I hadn’t gotten any sleep because I was so excited. When I got to my dorm I met my counselor who was in charge of my hallway and she greeted me with a smile and informed me I could still make it to the last placement class of the day at seven thirty. I went running to my room, yanked open my luggage, desperately trying to remember where I had packed my leos and tights. After a quick change I threw my hair up grabbed my dance shoes and headed over to the studio.
The studio was packed with a ton of excited and nervous dancers. I said hello to a few girls I had met the year before and then went to one of the ladies in charge to get an audition number. My number was fifty-one. It was one of the highest numbers in the seven thirty placement class. I hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours and I was a nervous wreck running on pure adrenalin. I slipped into the bathroom took a few deep breaths and said a prayer. I told myself to take the class like any other dance class and went and took my place at the barre.
The class went smoothly until center floor. We were broken up into groups of ten and I was in the last group, which gave me time to practice. Unfortunately that didn’t help. I was in the front and there was no mirror. I went blank. I knew it was a turning combination and I was turning only… in the wrong direction. I was an absolute panicky mess on the inside but I knew I had to keep smiling and at least pretend I knew what I was doing. Perhaps I could convince the judges everyone else was doing it wrong.
What was worse was that after the combination, one of the judges was asking each dancer if they had been to the intensive before and if so what level they had been in. I had totally screwed up the combination and now I got to answer that I had been in level four, which was the lowest level the year before. I had been desperately hoping to be moved up a level and now I figured I would be back in level four.
“Fifty one, have you been here before and if so what level were you in?” the judge asked. “Yes. Level four.” I replied. His jaw dropped a little bit then he looked down at his paper confused and back up at me and asked, “Are you sure?” Now I was a bit confused and replied, “Um yes”. He nodded and moved on down the line. I was embarrassed because I had messed up so badly. I was confused by the judge’s response and so incredibly tired. After class was over I went back to my dorm room, met my roommate and crashed. The next morning when the placement lists were posted I was shocked to find I had been moved up not one but two levels to level six. Perhaps I faked the combination better than I had thought.
The time at the intensive was awesome as was the next year and the nexts. Each year I came to appreciate more and more the very place I had wanted to leave so badly that first night. In fact I couldn’t wait to go back to the small town of Jackson, Mississippi each summer. I fell in love with the company. Not only were the company members amazing dancers but they were incredible people too. Each year I was blessed to move up in levels. The first year I was in level four, then in six, the next year in eight, and the last year in nine. This is a true testimony of how hard Candalee Wrede, my ballet instructor worked me during the year. I am incredibly indebted to her.
That second year not only affected my dancing, as a dance intensive should but also greatly affected my personality. Being that I had been there the year before I knew the lay of the land as it were and felt much more at ease allowing me to be bolder and much less shy.
Instead of waiting for someone to come over to introduce them self to me as I always had before I would be the first to say hello. But even so I was still not so keen on the performing aspect of my art form. I really didn’t like being in front of a large audience or any, for that matter, unless I knew my pieces backwards and forwards.
Well it was time for me to face a few of my fears I just didn’t know it. I am sure you all remember my roach scare the first night I ever spent in Mississippi well… this being the next year I had come to terms with the fact that there were going to be cockroaches, but I still didn’t want to be the one to have to deal with them. Fortunately my counselor kept a can of Raid available for our use.
Now the great thing about Raid is you don’t need to be any closer than a few feet from the vermins to hit them with it. The not so great thing about Raid is that you could drown them in the stuff, as I often did, and yet they would never really die from the stuff. Sure it would stop them for a bit but if you left them there and came back a while later the only evidence of a roach would be a large spot of Raid and a small trail leading away from it.
So I came up with a new plan I would stop the roach with a Raid attack and then go get someone else to smash the thing which is really the only effective way of killing them. I made it fairly obvious to the other girls in my hallway that I was not going to touch the insects.
So back to facing my fears… somewhere around the second or third week after a long day of classes I was in the crowded hallway of the dance studios which smelled of sweat and tired feet gathering my stuff to go get on one of the buses that would take us back to Belhaven Collage for diner when I heard a deep voice say my name.
A bit startled I look up into the kind but slightly intimidating face of John Vandervelde a company dancer and someone in charge at the intensive. Wondering what I had done wrong I waited for him to say more. He motioned me away from the rest of the dancers and asked, “Are you afraid of cockroaches?”. Shocked, a million thoughts went racing through my head like “How did he know” and “Wow Taralah you are pathetic”. After all when I was younger I had had no fear of bugs. So not wanting to sound as pathetic as I felt I answered saying, “I don’t like them”. That answer was good enough for him and he asked me to come sit in his office. Now totally confused I was wondering what I had gotten myself into and I found out soon enough.
When we sat down he told me about a skit he was putting together for one of the group gatherings we would have a few times each week. The company members often put on a skit for the students at the beginning and for this particular one he needed an audience member i.e. me to come out after he released a roach and some of the company members had acted terrified of it. He wanted me to yell at the company members calling them wimps then walk over to the roach smash it. He asked me to not say anything to anyone about it prier to the skit because he wanted to have a certain element of shock.
I agreed but dreaded it for the entire next day till that evening when we were doing it. I couldn’t believe I had gotten myself into this. It was bad enough that I had to step on a roach but I had to do it in front of hundreds of people and yell at the company members who I adored. Ironically the point of the skit was to show how something so small can cause unnecessary havoc in our lives when we let it.
Going through this experience I was forced to push past prior self inflicted restraints and fears. After which I have never been as shy nor afraid of audiences and from then on I would take care of any roaches on my own.
Jackson, Mississippi truly became my home away from home. People would ask if I would get home sick being gone for a month during the summer. I would smile and reply that it wasn’t during the one month in Mississippi that I was homesick but the eleven other months of the year.
When I was in my freshman year of high school I heard about this great arts school in Beaverton. My mom and I found out more information and started the application process. I wrote my essay, shadowed, interviewed with the principal, auditioned for the dance program, and then waited and waited and waited until I received a letter letting me know that I had made it into Arts and Communications Magnet Academy. The day I had shadowed I felt strangely at home. I loved that the people around me loved art and could express that no matter how strangely. I hadn’t ever experienced that at any other school.
I came to ACMA for dance and that was my focus here… at first. I wanted to graduate with a dance endorsement, but I came to a crossroads during my junior year that changed that. You see, I had been dancing at a great dance studio for years and I was finally an apprentice to their performing company. To get my dance endorsement, I had to choose between continuing to dance at my studio or join Dance West.
Though Dance West is a great company, I would have needed to dance a year with them to get my dance endorsement and I just couldn’t leave my studio. So halfway through my junior year, I left the dance program at ACMA and focused more time on getting my photo endorsement instead.
Photography was always a part of my life. Form those early days of learning the correct way to smile for the camera to seeing my mom’s work as she became a professional photographer. She did, and still does weddings, senior pictures, family pictures, etc. When I was old enough I would go with her on shoots to help carry equipment or if it was a large say wedding group and the kid in the front row wouldn’t smile, then I would have the very important job of making ridiculous faces till they did. This would also work when the adults were grumpy.
When I came to ACMA I didn’t have photo down as a class I wanted to take but that was the only way my schedule would work so my sophomore year I took Photo1 and began to really enjoy working in the darkroom. I was back and forth on whether I liked digital or analog photography better, but by the end of my junior year, I was absolutely head over heals in love with analog. Though it takes soooo much longer than a digital print would take, I loved getting a print just right. Often this was after hours of finessing in the darkroom.
Though I gave up my dance endorsement I did not give up my desire to dance with Ballet Magnificat. Throughout my junior year I was dancing six days a week, Monday through Saturday. Often I started at four and did not leave the dance studio till ten or eleven at night and then all day on Saturday. I would often fall asleep on top of my textbooks while studying for school.
I had given up more than sleep when I chose to seriously pursue dance. I really didn’t have a social life other than being at school, church or being in class with the other dancers at my studio. I had a few other friends, but I never got to spend any quality time with them because I was either in the studio or cramming for my next test. I can’t tell you how many times the words “sorry I have dance” has come out of my mouth. ”. I also had to give up other interests. I took piano lessons for a few years until my dance took precedence, but I look forward to one day, hopefully sooner rather than later, going back to that. I would always chuckle when I was asked if I had a boy friend. Smiling I would reply, “Nope. Really don’t have the time for that”.
Over the years I have followed Candalee Wrede to whatever studio she has taught at. In two thousand three she began teaching at a studio called Rap One. It was owned by two incredibly talented twin brothers by the names of Damon and Demetrius Keller. They are both fantastic tap, hip-hop, and krump dancers. They also had a wonderful jazz instructor, Lorena Aranda. Though the focus of the studio was these forms of dance, they understood and stressed the need for solid ballet training. I grew to love the people at Rap One which was later renamed Empyrean Movement and then later merged with MVP Dance Elite.
One of the many blessing that came with training at Rap One is I was able to take a partnering class. I had always wanted to learn how to partner but hadn’t had the chance before due to the shortage of male dancers. Both Damon and Demetrius, who we called De, were willing to help out in partnering class. I really enjoyed partnering class because I still had a sense of adventure. I would often called on to be the first one to try a new move, which frequently meant almost hitting the ground after attempting a new toss or jump or leap of some sort. I didn’t mind being the guinea-pig, as it were. I always trusted my partners to catch me and thankfully they always did.
After a year or so with Rap One I started taking jazz to help me improve certain moves in my ballet. Then in another year or so I decided to try taking a hip-hop class. I remember that first class when Damon had to constantly remind me to turn in, loosen up my movements, and hunch over instead of holding my back straight. I felt like a complete idiot. I was soon known as “Prima”, due to the fact I was really the only serious ballet dancer at the studio. I continued taking hip-hop, perhaps just for the entertainment that came from being able to laugh at myself after a hard day of classes.
The winter of two thousand five we put on a production called “Nutkrakr-The urban legend according to us”. Just as it sounds, it was a take off from the traditional classic Nutcracker ballet. I played the part of Clara and was the only ballet in the entire production. We took the traditional story line and updated it to the twenty-first century. For example, instead of the fight between the mice and the solders in the ballet, we replaced it for a dance off between two different street gangs, which included some incredible hip-hop and tap choreography. The show included speaking parts, ballet, hip-hop, jazz, tap, lyrical, and singing parts.
It was my first experience of being in a performance this large. We sold out both nights that we were performing and even had to add seats to the Winningstad Theater where we were performing. We packed in over three hundred both nights with people even sitting on the stairs. Because I was one of the main characters in the show, I was on the poster that was all over Portland. Let me tell ya, it is a strange experience to be walking down the street and see your face in the window of some coffee shop or business.
I was slowly improving in the areas of jazz, tap, and hip-hop, and was accepted as an apprentice to Empyrean Movement’s performing company the summer before my junior year. I was accepted as a full time company member at the end of my junior year. I was ecstatic. I couldn’t believe it. I loved dancing with the company who had really become a family to me over the years. They were the people who I danced with, sweated with, laughed with, and cried with. I couldn’t imagine a better place to be.
Right before spring recital two thousand eight, I had to make an incredibly difficult decision. I knew I needed to invest more time in my scholastic studies my upcoming senior year and knew that in doing so I would not be able give 100% to the company so I resigned. During my senior year I have continued my ballet training but not as much as before, though I still want to dance with Ballet Magnificat.
Today Ballet Magnificat has the two professional performing companies, Alpha and Omega. The companies tour nationally as well as internationally, performing original ballets such as Deliver Us, The Journey of the Prodigal Son, Ruth, Freedom, and The Hiding Place. Ballet Magnificat also has a school of the arts and a two level trainee Program. Both trainee companies also perform and tour on a smaller scale.
It is the trainee program that I will be auditioning for in a year. The trainee program is normally a two to four year program. Every year you have a review during which you could be let go. If you do make it through the whole program it is from the graduates of the trainee program that they will chose apprentices for their full time companies. If you are chosen as an apprentice, and the apprenticeship goes well, then you could be asked to stay on as a full time company member. It is only through the trainee program that they select their company members.
For the audition process you first send in a video audition in January. The video is to be according to their specifications as far as what combinations you do. IF they like what they see, then they will invite you for a live audition class with the other applicants. This takes place in March. After the audition they send out acceptance or denial letters within a week.
If accepted, you move to Mississippi in the fall. You would live with about five other trainees in an apartment. You train Monday through Friday each week from about eight in the morning to about three in the afternoon depending on rehearsal times. This gives you time to work in the afternoon and evening or take some college courses.
After I graduate, I am planning on training basically full time in preparation for this as well as working and hopefully taking a photo class at George Fox University in Newburg.
I wasn’t planning on taking any college courses till after I was done dancing, but as I said before, I fell in love with photography. I will be honest, I can not wait to be graduated. But I didn’t know what I was going to do if I didn’t have access to a dark room somewhere. Right now I feel as though I am on the outskirts regarding my creative potential in photography. I have so many ideas with what I want to do in this field and new ones come to mind almost every day.
Like I said I wasn’t planning on doing the college thing at all right after graduation, but a number of my closest friends were freshmen this last year at George Fox University and I have had the opportunity to hang there quite a bit and get to really know about the school. I like the atmosphere on campus and the feel of the classroom. Not to mention the people are great and the campus is beautiful.
The main thing that really got my attention and hooked me was the fact that GFU’s lab hours are twenty-four seven. This means that I could go in and use the dark room at two in the morning if I wanted. This is perfect because I will be spending most of my time in the dance studio training this next year which would give me very little time to work on homework or my own projects in the darkroom.
So perhaps you are all asking what if you don’t make it into Ballet Magnificat’s trainee program? Well to be honest, I am not entirely sure. I may look into a few other dance companies. Or I may perhaps work and take a few more classes or even start full time at college. I don’t know, but I do know that at some point whether in a year or ten or twenty or thirty I want to do some serious traveling.
I want to see many, many places but not the typical tourist style. I want to go where the tour buses don’t. I want to get to know the people and hear their stories. I want to positively touch their lives using the resources I have. I long to go anywhere from a village in Africa to an orphanage in India to the streets of Poland or Albania. Who are the people who live there and what can I learn from waking a mile in their shoes?
I began supporting an organization called Mercy’s Hope when I was in about eighth grade. The organization was started to support a couple in Rajahmundry, India who began an orphanage in their one room home and later moved to a different piece of land and helps over two hundred and fifty orphans as well as serves as a daycare for the children from the village who are left alone during the day while their parents are away working in the fields. They also support two leper colonies and much, much more.
Yet, there are many times they just don’t have enough to feed the many who depend on them. The couples name is David and Mercy Gollapalli. Sadly, David passed away in his sleep a few years ago. Mercy has continued with the help of her two grown children.
It was to this very orphanage I was headed this last fall. I was going with a team of about eight of us. We were going to build a kitchen because up to this point the cook prepares the meals in a big pot over an open fire in the middle of the courtyard and during the monsoon season in a small windowless room. Sadly, the trip had to be postponed, but hopefully will happen sometime this next year.
Perhaps one day I will be able to do more than a two-week trip to help build a kitchen. Perhaps one day I will be able to stay for a year or a few years somewhere.
So to be honest I don’t really know where I am headed, whether to a dance company, or college, or some other country, or none of these, or all of these. I really don’t know, but I am really ok with that.
