Swan Lake

Today I was walking through the RB and some kid (twelve or thirteen or fourteen--tops--years old) called out to me, "Hey, are you one of the dance professors?" I said no, I wasn't. Was he looking for one? He said he wasn't. I told him the dance department was on the second floor.

As I walked down the long hallway, heading back to the Fieldhouse, I analyzed why the kid might've asked me that. At first I thought, "ooo, maybe I LOOK like a dancer." You know, Balanchine body, hair pulled back (my hair is in a ponytail today, after all), graceful movements, all that sort of thing. But then I realized a few things, mainly that a) I do NOT have a Balanchine body and b) my hair doesn't look like the tight bun of a ballerina, but what it really is, which is a messy, wacked-curl mess, and c) I do not move gracefully; I'm always kicking things over and walking into door frames.

All of this musing happened over the space of several yards. The thing is, to that kid sitting on one of the couches, it probably looked like I had just walked out of one of the dance rooms. If I had walked out from, say, the vending machine alcove, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have asked. Maybe he would've said something more like, "Hey, is the vending machine out of Pop Tarts? or "Hey, do you have a quarter?"

Despite what I KNOW, it was still kind of nice to be asked, "Are you one of the dance professors?" I did dance once, of course. My mom stuck me in ballet at like age four or five (I fuzzily remember refusing to dance and hold some wand thing we were supposed to prance around with. Still had that pink tutu and leotard for years after). Then in middle school my parents decided I was sitting around too much and I took lessons at a dance studio in town for a couple of years. In high school I took a few classes and I even took a class in college. Stunning resume, I know. More than anything, dance just taught me to be more coordinated. Except that I still walk into the occasional door frame/ tree branch/ other person.