Dance Mom

Last week my four year old had her first dance recital and I had my first experience as a “Dance Mom”.  When I signed her up for dance class one day a week from September to the end of May, I never in a million years thought I’d undergo the true dance mom experience.  The 30 minute ballet/30 minute tap class was just supposed to be something different for us to do on hump day to help break up the otherwise long, monotonous week.  I did not realize it meant hundreds of dollars, late nights and *gasp* make-up!

                I began to have an inkling as to what exactly I had signed up for when it was February and her dance teacher told the moms that we owed $100 for dance recital costumes.  The instructor had picked out a Raggedy Anne costume (wig included!) to match their tap dance to “Raggedy Anne” and a blue puffy tutu get-up to go along with their ballet routine to the song “Rainbow Connection”.  The other moms oooh-ed and aaah-ed over the costumes and wrote their checks.  I wondered why a Raggedy Anne costume cost $50 but then just pretended like I knew this was coming all along and signed my check over with a plastic smile on my face.  Meanwhile, her weekly dance classes had turned into the same two songs (yes, “Raggedy Anne” and “Rainbow Connection”) played on repeat over and over and over again.  I was bored with hearing it through the wall so I could only imagine that my four year old was bored with it as well.

                Fast-forward a couple of months and we get to picture day, (more money to buy her dance photos!), and then dress rehearsal followed by the shows.  In the weeks preceded the recital, I began receiving emails from her dance school every other day.  These emails involved everything from when/how to buy tickets (yes more money spent!), instructions on what they needed to wear, how to do their hair and how to purchase flowers after the recital.  Honestly, I didn’t read them.  Who has time to read page after page of this crap?  I simply asked the other moms in her class what I was supposed to do and they kindly filled me in. 

                When the first recital came last Thursday I knew I was in over my head.  The backstage area was mobbed with moms and daughters and their fold out chairs, hanging racks, make-up/hair stations and snack bags.  My daughter and I cautiously crept to the corner of the room, backpack in hand, and sat on the floor.  I pulled out the $5 make-up kit that I had just purchased at CVS and began to apply blue eye shadow to my four-year-old’s eye lids.  I pulled out her costumes, slightly wrinkled since I didn’t own the miniature garment bags for children’s clothing that literally everyone else seemed to possess, and began to dress her.  Around us little girls ran left and right, compared costumes, snacked on Goldfish and sat dutifully in their chairs while their mothers shouted commands at them, “Close your eyes!  Don’t turn your head!  Stop touching your hair!”  After I finally managed to put my daughter’s hair into a “bun”, I shyly asked another mom if I could borrow her hairspray.  She handed me her giant can of spray, looked at my child, and said “First recital?”  I nodded “and last” I thought to myself.  When it was finally my daughter’s turn to be called to get into place for her first dance I hugged her hard and sent her along with the five other girls in her class then quickly hurried to my seat in the auditorium. 

                The lights dimmed.  I breathed a sigh groaning to myself as I recalled the fact that we would have to do this all over again for Saturday’s recital.  I could make out my daughter’s figure as she took the stage in the dark.  The lights went on.  The music that I had begrudgingly heard over and over again week after week began.  My daughter smiled brightly, spotting me in the front row. 

And I, well, I cried like a baby and couldn’t wait to see her in her next number.