Dance

This one was written shortly before I threw my back out, as were many of the dance-themed stories in this collection.

“Hey honey! Guess what, I have a surprise for you!” The woman greets her daughter.

“What is it?” the little girl asks as her mom signs her out of daycare and leads her to the car.

“I signed you up for dance class,” she announces, all smiles.

“Oh,” the little girl isn’t quite sure what to think.

“I’m sure you’ll like it. Just try it for a year.” The woman had been trying to come up with ways to get her shy daughter to meet new people and make more friends. Dance class would be perfect. The girl would meet people and have fun trying something new for a year.

The six-year-old wasn’t very excited for dance class. She wasn’t quite sure what it was and she didn’t know if she would like it. Plus, none of her friends would be there so she’d have to make all new ones. It was so hard to make friends with new people. She never knew what to say or how to act. But, she would try it for a year, to make her mom happy. Neither mother nor daughter could foresee the effects of that one little decision.

There was no way to know that two years down the road the girl would drop out of girl scouts because the meetings interfered with her dance classes. Who would have guessed that a year after that she would be placed in a talent group, costing an extra hour a week and another $30.00 a month. By the time the girl reached seventh grade, she had moved to more advanced levels and was at the studio two afternoons a week, as opposed to the two hours every Saturday. During her freshman year of high school, the young girl spent eight or nine hours a week at the studio. At the end of that year, she received a hundred dollar scholarship from the studio, which covered two weeks worth of classes.

The young child and her mother would be shocked to hear that during her junior year of high school, the girl was still dancing, still planning on dancing the following year, and even planning on continuing her dance career, at least through college. No, they were just expecting a year of making new friends in a new setting. Maybe next year it would be soccer, or softball.