Edit.

Ah editing.  A necessary evil for any published writer. Logically I know what my editors are trying to do.  They want to help my writing reach as many eyes as possible. It’s good for them and it’s good for me… but… I write my truth.  When I see my words twisted and changed, even if only a few of them, I can’t help but feel at least a twinge of irritation.

Last week one of my articles was FINALLY published on a fairly major online platform.  I say “finally” because it took about two and a half months after submission and acceptance for the editing and publishing process to be completed.  The email I received stating that the article was now live, viewable for the general public, was both exciting and anxiety producing. I was cooking dinner when I received it.  Obviously I had to check my email as soon as that familiar ding emanated from my phone. My OCD can not handle a number showing next to the email icon. I sat eating my salad, sapaghetti, and meatballs with my laptop propped on the table in front of me.  I shushed the family repeatedly as I scoured the words displayed on my monitor. I was on a hunt, in pursuit of whatever edits had mangled my words.

In all reality the vast majority of my words were not altered. Of course my original title for the article was changed, that I expected.  Overall the article was about 92% my truth.  I had written about my daughter the ballerina (Remember my post Grace.) and the realities of what goes into her training.  How crazy her life really is. I wrote the article because not a lot of people talk about what families with kids at this level REALLY go through.  Probably because it is not a large sample of the population that decides to back their seven year old’s declaration of wanting professional level training.  Had it been left up to my husband we never would have gotten this deep into all of this. I’m the intense one. Articles here and there touch on the sacrifices of time, money, etc. made for your kid’s elite level training.  However I have never seen an article really describing the world that is our reality. I think it is something that needs to be said, that kids and parents considering going forward with that kind of training need to know what they are getting themselves into.  My editors did a good job of keeping my overall message but there was an underlying point that ended up missing from the published product.

Part of the pressures and absurd standards on these girls stem from the studio.  Flat out, no candy coating, they want our money. They push the girls to do more and more by pitting them (and their parents) against each other.  The director’s wife is well versed in identifying the most competitive in the group. She has created an art out of slyly suggesting that other girls are better dancers and more advanced.   Then she slips into her sales pitch about extra training opportunities. It’s an easy trap to fall into. The majority of studios do this, ours has perfected the game over many years of business.  After all that is just what it is, a business. When my daughter graduates in five years she will be just another girl that went through the program. A past student that pops into their minds from time to time when they see a similar dancer or play one of her videos to help the new crop of girls learn choreography.  Part of the point of the article as it was originally written was that it took us a long time to realize we were falling into this trap. I wanted to give other parents a heads up to look out for similar situations that take advantage of them and their children. This behavior shows up in every sport and activity, it is not unique to dance studios.  All star cheerleading was one of the worst we encountered, We’ve luckily moved on past that environment.

The editors also changed wording that made the article allude to the idea that Ballerina daughter was going to stop her high level training.  Even the new title seemed to suggest her departure. This isn’t the case. She came home yesterday with knee pain likely stemming from tight hips after a two week break from training (her summer “off” season).  She is now in the middle of an intensive that involves forty hours of dance for three weeks straight. I told her to ice, pop some IBuprofen, and mark jumps today if it gets too bad. As my article suggests I am now looking for ways to mediate training so she has at least some time to socialize with school peers.  That doesn’t mean I’m pulling her from the program or that I do not understand that for her to reach her overall goal training is going to continue to be intense.

My relationship with the editing process is very love/hate.  Like I said, it’s a necessary evil that as a writer I need to accept. One that at times will make me roll my eyes or bitch to my husband.  I want eyes on my work though. I can’t achieve that goal without the editing process. Doesn’t mean I can’t set the record straight here.

P.S. Here’s the article: https://www.popsugar.com/family/How-My-Daughter-Ballet-Training-Affected-Her-Friendships-46002429

Grace.

In my youth I was a ballerina.  I spent minutes, upon hours, upon days, upon years criticizing myself in a mirror.  Watching for the slightest flaws and imperfections, striving for an ideal of beauty and a grace that I would never find.  That was the nature of the beast, each one of us pulling and twisting at the bar, pushing ourselves harder to give even more effort across the floor, never having a chance of achieving our absolute goal.  Eventually, at one rehearsal or performance we would be at our best. Maybe that day we would know that this was it, the moment that all the work had been for, the top of our peak. For most of us it snuck up and away quietly, we collected our “good jobs” as we iced our feet and packed our bags ready to go back to the studio to continue our chase towards the perfection that we would never come that close to again.  Whether we had already reached our peak or not we realized that we would never actually perform a dance impeccably. There would be a turn that we came out of a hair too early or a jump that could have been higher, such is the life of a dancer. You wonder why we’re all so wound up. Over time I learned to create lines with my body that would give an illusion of fluidity and ease. I would grab my legs with my hands and pull them into angles that would make them appear more beautiful to my audience, meanwhile stretching my joints to a point that they would never fully recover from.  I learned to balance myself only on the very tip of my toes breaking nails and skin in the process. In the beauty and grace of my dance was the somewhat morbid underside of the cause and effect.

I now have a daughter who is striving for the same ballerina perfection.  She spends most afternoons in class pushing, bending, sweating. She watches the girls around her and uses their success to drive herself forward.  She wants the long high extension, the clean triple pirouette, the over split in the grande jete. Her weekends have been sacrificed for rehearsals, and her social life now centers around the other ballerinas she spends all her time with.  She too understands that she will never be one hundred percent perfect but continues to strive to get as close as possible. Her blisters and muscle pulls battle wounds she shares proudly.

Outside of the studio two of the traits most often attributed to this daughter are grace and beauty.  People watch her because she is, in fact, beautiful and as human beings we enjoy things that are aesthetically pleasing.  Even her movements are beautiful, she holds herself and moves through her world in a way that only comes with years of ballet training.  We tease her regularly for running into walls and tripping over stairs, but watching her tell a story with her hands is like watching an art form.  I supposed that would make sense, dance being a performing art. An art that has been slowly infusing into every aspect of her life. I wonder though, what if the focus on the ideal beauty and the grace she and I have spent so many hours trying to achieve is blinding us to the beauty and grace inherently in our lives?  While this daughter is being complimented on encompassing the ballerina archetype, I look at my other two children and see a beauty and grace in them as well. Just not the versions you are going to find in an opera house on a Saturday night.

We all have our own definition of both Beauty and Grace, most of which are inherently intertwined.  Sometimes we find examples of these qualities it in movement, such as in the ballerinas mentioned above, or in the way a gazelle runs across an open plain.  Daily examples are found in the sky when the wind blows shapes and spirals in the clouds, or when it causes the sway of leaves and branches on a tree. I find grace and beauty in words.  Words that hit me deep in my core. I find examples in books and poems, in some works the entire story or prose striking me, in others just a phrase. At times I find these traits in words that are simply said aloud.  Those perfect pairings shared with you right when you needed to hear them. Some religions find grace and beauty in forgiveness. While I am not someone who tends to find any peace in the act of forgiving and forgetting, I can appreciate the allure.  I imagine this like a grace and beauty in the soul that, much like the ballerina, they are working to consistently perfect.

In our attempts to find and quantify grace and beauty in our lives we often overlook some of the most obvious sources.  Are grace and beauty not inherent in the older woman who has learned from her experiences? She has lost and laughed, watched the world change and observed the people around her as she has lived her life.  Maybe these traits are found in her attempts to share the lessons she has learned, with anyone willing to slow down and listen. Maybe they are in the feet and joints of the dancer. The pain and bruising a simple reminder that she is human, and not invincible.  Perhaps they are in our day to day lives, the warmth we feel when we first sip our coffee in the morning. In the way that I as I sit and edit I wonder if my words are too contrived, then having to remind myself that I have promised to freely write releasing myself from the fear of judgement.

Perhaps we are trying too hard to achieve the ideals of grace and beauty and in the process are losing out on the pieces of these traits we are granted as we live our lives.  Perhaps if we listened to the old woman this is what she would tell us. Her message warning us that in every moment we live and every emotion we feel holds an opportunity we are usually so quick to overlook.  Hopefully we can remind ourselves to pay heed to the little occurrences and observations that hold the beauty and grace we need, while we continue to strive for the ideals and perfections we want.