A SCHOLARSHIP!? ME?! …Well, about time!

Wearing::  Gray cut off sweatpants & a radically bright blue/white halter top with a white sweatband.
Last ate::  Half a donut (The first of which I’ve eaten in about three years), a PBJ (my dad finally bought me whole wheat bread I’m excited), and I’m currently eating a combo of almonds, peanuts, and sunflower seeds.  I’m still hungry so nuts will kill it.  They’re good for that.  Yea… I’m not hungry anymore.

But screw all of the introductions and everything… they’re not important… because I GOT A FREAKING SCHOLARSHIP HOMIE!  ::freaks out and dances:: 
And now I’ll tell the story.  SO.  On Friday the dance convention started.  (A dance convention is two days of dancing- eight hours a day so sixteen total.  It’s kinda rough if you’re not used to it.)  It’s called Image Dance Explosion and it’s run by this really sweet woman named Aiesha Ashby.  It’s a relatively new convention and it was held in Austin (where I live) about ten minutes away at a local high school.  Not important either.  But Friday I wasn’t really on tap and what really pissed me off during classes was that none of the teachers would freaking look at me (except for one, during the turns and leaps class who worked with me a lot).  I was like SHIT I’M OVER HE-ERE!!  Not even hip hop.  I was about average in that particular hip hop class (for me) and that would still (not to be conceited but to be truthful) put me in the top 10%.  But the teacher wouldn’t even fucking look at me.  The next day, Saturday, I was in auditions at 8 and everything was clicking for me.  I made the first cut (which I’ve only done once before) and hten I made the second cut… and the third cut.  I was freaking out, homeboy… I was picked with eleven others to perform at the end of the convention faculty show (with the teachers who are always the most incredible dancers EVER, HEHE) and I’d never had that happen before.  It was awesome.  And then in classes?  I was fucking ON, man, OOOH!  HAHAHAHA!  I don’t even fully remember what happened during hip hop… Except that the whole class started cheering me on and THAT is what really gets my ass going.  I hammed up the entire class and by the end everyone was laughing and cheering and complimenting me and I was dancing directly next to Aiesha with two other girls somewhere on the other side.  All I know is that everytime I stopped dancing to switch places with someone else waiting on the sidelines to dance… everyone was staring at me.  I was in the zone and it was the best moment ever.  I went out to have a thirty minute lunch (my only break in an 8-3 pm day with a performance afterwards) and my stomach threw a fit with the food I put in it because of all of the adrenaline I’d worked up. 
Anyway, at the end of the faculty show they were announcing the awards and several girls from my studio won Performance Awards… which are basically Honorable Mention awards.  It was awesome.  I was starting to get really down on myself even though all of the teachers had been so into me all day that maybe… I just hadn’t been good enough to win a scholarship, even one of the little dinky awards.  And then it fucking happened.  The guy next to me won a scholarship to the best dance studio in California… and then I won a scholarship to Aiesha’s own personal studio for a weeklong intensive next summer.  I was like OH SHIT!  Because I didn’t even win the award that says, "Hey, you’re great, we want to hand you off to someone else to train"… I won the award that says, "We love you, we work well with you, and we want to train you!!!!"  I was freaking out it was unbelievable! 
This year I have grown so much and IT IS ABOUT DAMN TIME!  I have never won any scholarships before this year and I’ve won this, a scholarship to a competition’s convention (Starlight), and an award to audition for a talent agency.  My solos also won an amazing amount of overalls and it… I don’t know… it’s just about damn time.  Honestly, it’s not really about the fact that I won a scholarship… it’s about the fact that I was finally RECOGNIZED for working my ass off so hard for all of my life.  The recognition is what really makes me happy and feel proud.  I dance for other people and I don’t feel successful unless my audience smiles or cries or laughs or gets angry.  I don’t.
My gift/my talent… was recognized… and appreciated. 

-INMATE-