For the longest time, I did not take dance seriously. I had to spend 2 or 3 classes on the same sequence of moves because I never practiced, and consequently never remembered, the moves.
Then a new girl joined my teacher.
It was all very teen movie-ish: the status quo is disrupted with the arrival of someone new, the top of the ecosystem ripples and morphs, and the whole world seems to change in just a few weeks.
(Of course, as all the nerds or plankton or, as was in my case, tripping tutu-wearing toddlers, would tell you, nothing actually changes at all.)
There wasn’t a bully in my case. There was no Regina George, no Plastics at all (we were 11 or 12-year-old pipsqueaks, of course, there wasn’t!). Neither was I, of course, at the top of the ecosystem (though I certainly liked to think I was).
But I did like to pout and scowl in the last row of rehearsals about why such a newcomer was leading us all.
I became best friends (or, at least, best among the other dancers, though that doesn’t say much considering there aren’t even that many girls my age) with a girl I considered pretty and who liked to rant to me about our new lead dancer. I liked to listen to her because it always made me feel like I was being less petty when I thought nasty things since at least I never complained so loudly about them.
Of course, that only meant I was being all the pettier.
The new girl in question is someone I’ve known for a long time, if only peripherally. She’s the daughter of one of my teachers, so I often see her every now and then. She’s actually danced for quite a long time. Before she joined my teacher, though, she only went to the local ballet school, which was sort of bad at actually imparting good technique. By which I mean, that when she (and later, some other students from that school) first came to my teacher, she could not do the splits, had poor posture, and didn’t even turn out. It was like watching a swan trying to fly like a chicken: it just did. Not. Work.
But she truly did love dancing. Within a year, she had far surpassed me—straight to the front—while I remained petty in the back.
I told myself it didn’t matter. I was better than her at math and everything else academically, who cares if she dances the lead? Besides, the only reason she got the position was that she was willing to waste hundreds of hours and risk breaking her neck to fail at a one-handed front walkover. Who wants that, anyway?
Clearly, I did. That was the year I started stretching every day and actually practicing ballet at home. That was the year I actually started trying pirouettes, rather than simply waving them off as “not my thing.” And that was when I fell in love with dance. I discovered that dance could be a world all my own to get lost in, to be free. And once I found that world of mine, I can’t ever be petty about it again. This world is pure and simple and nothingness, and there’s nothing in the world that can justify ruining that.
As I write this, I’m at a math camp (MOP) taking a test (TSTST) that will determine next year’s USA IMO (international math olympiad, the world’s most prestigious math contest) team. One of the people here was telling me that some people can get toxic after the test when they don’t get in.
It makes sense, somewhat. Because they’ve worked years for this opportunity. Their presence here at MOP means that they’re the winners, but this test will determine if they’re the ultimate winners. But at the same time, it’s precisely due to this that makes the situation even more painful. Because to many of the other kids here, math competition is their whole life. TSTST is the cumulation of their hobbies and life thus far. And when your whole world revolves around one thing, why would anyone ruin it?
Pettiness and jealousy is a choice: one that I refuse to make. So I won’t.
It’s not that simple, but sometimes, it’s just easier to think it might be.