Pirouette

 A turn or series of multiple spins around on one leg done on pointe or on demi-point. We can either turn outwards, which is called en dehours, or inwards, which is called en dedans. It sounds cool, but it’s a frustrating step for me right now as a perfectionist. My daily concern is my inability to follow through with certain steps in class, but I know I am getting there with daily practice after class. I think that I do alright when we're going slow, but once things speed up or when we're supposed to do several moves in succession, it all falls apart for me. Stretching every day and practicing after class to improve has certainly gotten me somewhere in class. If there is one thing I have taken notice of about my body, is my self-discipline of working extra hard after class to prepare myself for next day. To be honest, pirouette are fun to do for ordinary non dancers, but for ballet students most especially beginners like me, we tend to over think the step to prepare us to do the turn; just as my professor will always tell me with her sweet encouraging voice “That’s it Zainab, you're getting it.”  I know I do get it perfectly sometimes, and sometimes its funny to look at.

As a good dancer outside of class, with my high level of consistency of wanting to get things right, I know with more practice, I can be a good ballerina if I overlook how other people perceive me; which was part of my daily struggle when I started dancing as a black student here at Loyola. I over looked certain things that I have experienced and I told myself if one dance professor I once participated in her class doesn’t appreciate me as a dancer who is better than some of her  dance students just because of my skin-tone, most especially for the fact that I am an African student learning modern dance outside my culture, then she must have been blind to see the potential and the gift of having a dedicated dancer in her class.

For some weeks in class, we started our Sauté step, which are small jumps on two legs, landing on both legs. After weeks of learning pirouettes, which we are still learning to perfect, hearing a new step was awesome to my ears. It was fun to jump up high and land for most students, but it wasn’t fun for me; because I understand every step in ballet is a preparation for another step with technicalities. Sauté as they sound can be breath taking, but when some major steps are added; it goes from fun to dizziness. But my best part of dancing everyday in class is getting to learn new steps from my professor and learning new learned lessons from her as a professional dancer that Ballet dancing is known for gracefulness and elegance, and as ballerinas we tend to glide across the stage almost effortlessly; which makes watching of ballet videos in class a strive of wanting more to appear tall and light when dancing.