The Perfect Dress...

     Eighth grade formal dress? Not that big a deal right? Well try finding one that's appropriate for the formal, your "eighth grade recognition assembly" and church on Easter. Here's a hint, it takes you, your aunt, your mom, five stores and around sixty dresses.

     There were the oh dear god no dresses;

   



    I must admit I honestly did have fun trying on these awful dresses. I found them quite amusing--even if they did make me look like a sixty year old woman going to bingo Tuesday...

    Don't I look like I'm in pain in some of these dresses? Trust me, it wasn't a look. I actually was in pain in some of them.

    There was the this is a cool dress but not appropriate for any of the three categories dress;
                                                               

    Oh and of course the dress my dad would've LOVED (you know black or white--shows nothing?) which was this one;

        Or as I like to call it-the little black dress that every woman should have one of but not for an eighth grade formal nor eighth grade graduation.

 

     There were several other dresses that I'm not going to embarrass myself by showing you. I.E. the dress that looked like something off of Preacher's daughters...or the blue dress that cut off circulation to my brain. Of course I don't even have pictures to show you because my dear old mom didn't even take pictures of them. I should be glad though...my brother probably would've used them to blackmail me into telling him the name of my crush or something.

 

     In all truth, several of these dresses were tried on after I found my perfect dress--mostly because my Aunt didn't think yellow was a good color on me. However nothing else fit as well and was no where near as durable or multi-occasion. So by now you're sitting on the edge of your seat thinking 'her dress has got to be better than some of the awful ones I just looked at, right?' Never fear, I have a picture;

 

                                                             

(Just to clarify--it's the golden yellow one, not the weird polka dot thing in the back)

 And now, a small fortune later I have new problems. Hair, shoes, make-up, jewelry?

 

Shoes, more shoes, no not those shoes, ah what the heck, get some more shoes!

     I am a girl, therefore I do like shoes. This is normal. However these "Shoes" we speak of include sneakers, boots, high tops, stilettos, ballet flats--you get the idea.
 
      Do they include Pointe shoes?

      Because I am sad to say, if it does, I can no longer enjoy shoes. For I hate Pointe shoes, I hate them with a passion. I am proud to say I have genuine malicious feelings blossoming for this type of shoe.

       Now as I'm almost positive you don't know much about these wonderful shoes I will explain them to you. Pointe shoes (aside from being the bane of my existence) require ribbons that have to be tied a certain way and are always too tight or too lose (at least on mine). They also need elastics to help the shoes support your feet. If you've ever been on a balance beam imagine something like that for what we have to balance on. Some people seem to think Pointe shoes are rather easy to balance because they are supposedly made of wood. This is wrong, in reality we may have layers of satin, glue and paper mixed together to balance on (this does not apply to ALL pointe shoes),but no wood.

                                                          
      Monday night I spent an hour and a half cutting these elastics and ribbons off of my Pointe shoes just to sew them back on. By the end of my Pointe class...wait for it...my elastics were falling off.

    So before my next Pointe class I'm going to spend ANOTHER hour trying to fix my shoes. At this rate I'm going to be spending all of my free time (which there is already a very noticeable lack of) fixing Pointe shoes. This is not how I want to spend my free time.

     Aside from the demonic elastics, I am also sick of falling in these shoes. But my klutziness is another blog, for another day.

   So yes I hate Pointe shoes, but aren't there types of shoes that you hate as well? There must be one type. You may hate high heels (for this I will not blame you). You could find sneakers unattractive. You might dislike the chunky heeled boots (which personally, I find quite comfortable).

    My pointe (ha, see what I did there?) however stands thus: Pointe shoes are evil. They are mean and cruel and sadly as I am a dancer, I suppose I'll just have to get over it. Won't I?

The Master Juggler

Once in a while,
you go to the carnival,
you get a balloon (probably due to your child's begging),

and then you see the juggler...

This juggler juggles a brick,
a baseball bat,
and a bowling pin,
he doesn't take the easy route,
and just juggle bouncing balls...

My life is juggled all around,
with time for homework and studying,
orchestra and choir,
family and a minuscule social life,
mostly though, my life is dance...

Pointe class and technique as well as variations,
and a dance teacher screaming,
corrections every step of the way...

At night my dreams are filled,
filled with dreams of college,
and maybe someday dancing on Broadway...

Once in a while though,
I look back and consider the way my life would be,
if I didn't do everything I do now,
always though, in less then a second,
I snap back to the present,
and again and again realize,
I wouldn't trade my life for anything...

So at the end of the day,
when the Juggler's hands empty,
all I can think over and over,
is I thank you my muses for blessing me,
with my abilities in the arts,
I thank you muses for giving me balance,
and the ability to truly, be a master juggler.