Chop Wood, Carry Water

As beautiful as it is to watch, some aspects of the ballet are brutal and unforgiving. Losing a coveted role to someone else. Being hungry and eating as little as possible to maintain a slender body. Touring across the United States for ten weeks of one night stand performances and sleeping in a different seedy hotel every night. Dancing on twisted ankles and blistered toes. And then there are the devasting and embarrassing incidents that come up unexpectedly, like wardrobe malfunctions and falling flat on your ass in front of a sea of people.

It was 1964 in New York City during a sweltering heat wave. I was sixteen, standing on the landing of a seven step staircase at the world famous School of American Ballet. I looked down at a large studio filled with young ballet students. There were no air conditioners, only ceiling fans that blew the hot air around. Wall to wall barres made up the perimeter of the studio and the dancers were stretching and fidgeting in the odd ways that dancers do, pulling at their leotards, rolling their necks, putting one leg on the barre and bending forward from the waist until their flat chests kissed their shins.

I’d wanted to get there early so I could take my place at the barre undetected, but during the drive from Worcester, MA. to Manhattan, my mother had gotten lost several times. The Cagan curse of absolutely no sense of direction. My shoulders were taut, my fingers clenched as I got ready to enter the room. I was about to audition for the renowned choreographer legend George Balanchine, artistic director of the New York City Ballet. And now, I would have to walk down the stairs in full view of everyone – not that anyone was looking. They were gazing at their reflections in the mirrored wall that ran the length of the front wall of the studio.

Trying to act casual and composed, I took the first step off the landing. I lost my footing, I slid forward and fell loudly, step by step, to the bottom of the staircase. Everyone stopped fidgeting, pulling, bending, and stretching for a brief moment and stared at me as I landed. I had made my entrance into this scary world not neatly, quietly, and inconspicuously, but instead, awkwardly with a roar and a bang, a red face and a wounded body. To make matters worse, no one at the barre wanted to move to give me any space so I had to physically push someone forward.

Being a professional bellerina was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but it was also the best. I got to be a real live dancer, living my dream, but the only way to get there was to show up at the studio every day, tired or not, hurting or not, and do the long term training that would earn me the glory of performing on stage every night. The gorgeous costumes and fierce makeup. The sparkling tiaras and glittering earrings. The tutus and pink pointe shoes. The energy of an expectant audience, waiting and watching.

In the world of ballet, the magic of performing eclipses all of the tough training so you have to find a way to enjoy the process, to do whatever it takes to reach a goal that initially seemed unreachable as you claim mastery over every muscle in your body. You turn the impossible into the possible and bask in the energy of a packed audience who are expecting excellence.

This kind of dedication is not singular to the ballet. It takes the same effort and repetition to achieve excellence in any field, aritistic or not.

 “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration,” said Thomas Edison.

 Lots of little girls want to be ballerinas. They prance around in tutus – until the dedication required becomes a reality. Most of them leave the ballet but there are some of us who kept on going. We were willing to be awkward until our bodies began to understand a new language, a new way of moving and contorting into new shapes that seemed impossible at first. I remember working diligently every day to finally do the splits. Learning to do Piqué turns as I spun from one side of the room to the other and did my best to avoid bumping into walls. Balancing and jumping on my toes, leaping through the air and landing gracefully and lightly back down again. And doing these things all day every day.

It all started for me when I was six and I saw a newspaper photo of British prima ballerina, Margot Fonteyn. Her pink pointe shoes. The delicate pink ribbons that criss crossed her ankles. Layers of diaphanous tulle that draped her body and the way she gracefully held her arms above her head, standing on her toes with a sparkling tiara on her head. I vowed to learn to do what she did and it’s a mystery to me why the hard work didn’t discourage me. I just did it. I somehow understood that the training was simply part of the deal and each time I fell, I got up and carried on.

A friend once asked me why I chose such a demanding athletic endeavor. How did I find the discipline to keep going and deal with the pain? I still don’t have an answer. It was like the old cliche: “I didn’t choose it. It chose me.” I don’t recall making a decision to train like that when I was teaching my feet to obey my mind. I just figured that if I kept going for however long it took, I’d probably get where I wanted to be. And I did.

When Olympic gold medal winners Michael Phelps and Simone Biles were asked how it felt to be a champion, they both said that they didn’t think they were better than anyone else. They just worked harder.

There is a phrase in Buddhism: To reach enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.

Once you are enlightened, chop wood, carry water.

To me this means that whether you’re at the start of your journey or well along the path, you have to stay humble and do the work. The rest will follow.