This post was meant to be up yesterday for world ballet day but I got stuck in Berlin during the storm and was busy refreshing newspages for updates on how to get home.
Right now, I’m on set for “Berlin Station” Season 2 and have nothing better to do so here we go.
I started Ballet at the age of 3 at a local ballet school. I loved watching ballet but soon started hating the classes so I quit a year later. I spent a long time hating ballet after that, I can’t even say way but I guess I was traumatized.
At 14, I came across this show called “Dance Academy”, which was the first time I actually took the time to watch ballet again and it made me really determined to start ballet again. I wasn’t flexible at all, so I was determined to change that and started stretching every night. It did pay off and I got my splits within like a month, but at one point I was just too over ambitious and injured my hamstring. My self-diagnosis was that it was probably a tear because I heard something rip and I had problems with that leg for years. That didn’t get me down though and I started taking classes at a small ballet school run by a russian teacher.
It was a small class and there were only 2 other girls in my class. I was getting discouraged very fast so after about a year and a visit from a former student of my teacher’s I decided I really wanted to improve faster and started really making an effort, trying to take in as much as possible and watching ballet videos on youtube every chance I got.
My first ballet performance was 3 months after I started ballet and I was proud as hell I got to be in it because we got to perform alongside professionals from a Russian touring company in Swan Lake. In a way that’s actually still my biggest performance to date, if you go by audience size.
After about 1,5 years I was certain I wanted to do more ballet but it wasn’t possible in my school, that was only offering an hour a week.
Luckily there was a new school set to open when I entered 11th grade and I started going there 4 times a week, not just for ballet but also modern, jazz and acro. The part I was most excited about was finally starting pointe. I had never realized how lucky I was with my feet, because I never worked on them before yet my teacher allowed me to start pointe due to my natural arch.
Before starting at the school, I injured my other hamstring, probably another tear, though the doctor couldn’t be bothered to actually find out what’s wrong with it. I heard a tear again, during warmup in school PE class (we did gymnastics). That was a huge set back and the injury still hurts sometimes.
The other girls in my pointe class had been on pointe for a while, so I always had motivation to get better.
I loved trying out different styles of dance, although ballet will always be my favorite.
I quit acro after 2 years after showing absolutely no talent for it (basically I’m scared of everything and have no strength at all, which is a great combo for acro).
After finishing high school I had more time and wanted to do more ballet. I did my research, talked to some people and decided for community college classes with this wonderful teacher in Berlin.
It started out as just one day a week but it quickly turned into more as I absolutely loved her classes and the environment there.
I did my community college classes and trained at my ballet school for a year and even got to perform a solo with my ballet school, which was both exciting and incredibly nerve-wrecking for me as I’m really not the most confident person on the planet. I loved the opportunity though, which made it all the much harder to decide and leave the school at the end of october, but there are more opportunities out there for me, I want to move to the city, spend some time abroad and really need to focus on university.
I tried getting into dance programs at universities, which did not work out for me. I’m not sad about that though, seeing the competition there really made me realize that I have A LOT to learn and it’s really hard getting into those programs.
I’m happy with where I am in my life right now, I’m happy I get to travel and study the (academic) thing I really want to do in college now. I have a super encouraging teacher who keeps pushing and reminiding me that it doesn’t take a fancy school to be a dancer. If it’s meant to be, I’ll get there, if not I still have my college degree to fall back on, which I wouldn’t have if I studied ballet full time.
I hope you enjoyed this post!
Yours
Laulie
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