Ballet couture

"Is there a surgery that will make me a ballet dancer?"
~White Girl Problems

Sometimes (but mostly the time period not long after I watched Black Swan), I wish I still did ballet. Then after thinking about it for two seconds, I realize that it isn't really the dancing part that makes me want to do it again, but because I just want an excuse to own dance-y clothes, like pointe shoes with leg warmers. A totally ridiculous notion, because pointe shoes are supposed to be even more painful than four inch stilettos, and there's literally no reason why I would wear pointe shoes if I'm not going to walk on my toes in them. (Not to mention how strange that would look in everyday life.) But ah, if there's anything I miss about those years of ballet lessons, it was seeing that poster with the entire recital's costume pictures.


Me, in second grade. I was supposed to be a Russian painting. Can you tell?

I took ballet lessons at the local dance studio in first, second, and fifth grade. I don't really remember why I did it for so many years; at first, it was part of the usual repertoire of suburban Asian-American extracurricular activities (along with piano, art, tennis, golf, and horseback riding), but it later became just another part of my weekday activities. I was never particularly very good at it--by the time my fifth grade semester ended, I realized one of the reasons why I sucked was because I could never memorize choreography (partly due to the fact that I was also the only kid in the class who never practiced).

Every once in a while (but usually only in yoga or when I randomly break into a pirouette (one of the few ballet steps I remember)), I still get asked whether or not I still dance. I'm flattered, and while I only wish I had the grace of a ballerina, I do kind of want to be back in dance again for the tulle and the satin and the velvet...

Maybe I'll just settle for dressing like a ballerina. Like the J. Crew Russian ballet photo shoot from the September catalog!








xoxo, vivian