Creative Writing

I have been dancing since I was two. It has always been a passion of mine. I grew up watching my cousins Kristen and Becca dance and compete from the time I can still remember all the way to the time they graduated college.

Although I had danced my entire life by the time I was eleven I had never competed. It was never something that interested me or maybe it scared me: the pressure of being on a team. Anyway I was content to continue simply taking classes and performing in recitals. That was until my friend Hannah changed her mind.

I have known Hannah longer than I have been dancing. We are good friends and have been dancing together almost as long as we have known each other. It was Hannah’s idea to try out for company or the competition team at the studio we went to. I was just along for the ride at first, I wasn’t opposed or ecstatic about the idea but it grew on me. Not long after, the desire to be on company had grown and I wanted it bad.

All summer I worked hard in my dance classes to be ready for auditions. I was feeling confident except for one thing we had to audition for tap. To be in company you have to be in tap, which means you have to audition for tap.  The problem was I hadn’t taken a tap class since I was three.

Finally the day of the audition rolled around and I was incredibly nervous! Right off the bat I knew it was going to be a long audition because I couldn’t even do the warm ups. It was horrible everyone else could do the combinations wit ease but I couldn’t even do the simplest steps. Eventually the teacher had to dumb everything down for me. It was humiliating; I have never been so embarrassed in my life.

The next Friday we received an email telling us I we made the team. I checked the email and I didn’t make it. I didn’t make the team.