The Studio {Chapter One - Miss Joan}

Miss Joan 

September 2009

Swan Lake, Op. 20, Act II: 13. Dances of the Swans

Four girls start ballet on the same day, in the same month. They are all the same age, give or take a few months - and they are all quiet, a little awkward, and eager to please. Miss Joan, as is her custom, writes their names in her class-plans and attendance journal, each name neatly lettered next to two columns. One, for her initial assessment after the completion of the first week. Another, which often stays blank for some time (and other times, no time at all) - her “break through” column. Here, she’ll jot down simple reminders to herself of success inside the classroom. Finally figured out her spot, first double pirouette or Achieved middle split!! She liked to read through these notes on days that are hard or when she needed a reminder of why she continued running the school and its company in the first place.

On the evening she writes down the four girls’ names, she uses her emerald pen. They are the start to a whole new page, the rest of the year unfurling beneath Joan’s feet and she feels especially refreshed after a summer spent in the quiet retreat that is only having to teach company class in the mornings and not having any toddlers raising bedlam through the halls. These girls, in their un-scuffed single-sole slippers are her little daises, and she is proud of her garden. Turning from the upright piano lying dormant in the corner serving as her make-shift desk, Joan watches the girls as they gather up their items and leave class, chattering indistinctly among themselves. In their retreating backs, Joan sees a flash of herself walking through the same doors at twelve, scrawny neck craned as high as possible in attempt to make herself feel taller next to her friends, who had suddenly become willowy nymphs over the summer. These girls echo that same pattern. The smallest one, Eloise, sparkles with electricity even after a difficult a technique class followed directly by an hour of pre-pointe. She stands on the balls of her feet, poised for flight. Joan feels the tug of her heart even without glancing at the other girls. She sees how they are already turning their sunflower faces towards Hannah, and how she leads them out the door, carried on her tide of conversation and perfectly arched feet. The girls think if they know her, they can become her. Joan knows that nothing they do will ever come close to what Hannah’s got, already in two classes she’s seen enough to know that Hannah will quickly outstrip her classmates. Hell, Joan might as well hand her the role of Clara right now, weeks before auditions. 

She takes a deep breath. This is why she always tries to wait a week of classes before writing down her initial prediction for a student, even when she has the feeling of something magic under her fingertips. After all, Margot and Bailey could surprise her. Sure, she hasn’t noticed anything from them yet that sparked her interest, but there are two classes left before she will sit down with her notebook, her pens, and a cup of tea to prepare for the following week. Even then, she will try her best not to hold herself to that initial assessment. There is something to be said for the girl’s who respond to the discipline and rigor of ballet with resiliency and determination. The ones who dig deep and thrive in the rigid environment that is training to be a ballerina. Joan has seen more than one young woman like Hannah who either couldn’t take it or didn’t have the heart to stick with it. 

Joan tries to not let those girls bother her. 

She should try and focus on things she can control, like pouring herself into these new daises and nurturing their passion and grit for the things that are worth having. The hard stuff. She reminds her students often that nothing good ever comes easy, and while she’d guess 50% of them roll her eyes and mock her for her wacky sayings, she knows at least 40% are listening to her carefully and tattooing her words on their soul (the other 10% are never listening and never were). She knows it will be her they hear in their head as they take their first bow as a soloist, and she tries to show them that she loves them enough to tell them the truth about the world and their place in it. Of course, these four have no idea that they’re in for frequent Joan lectures on respect and etiquette in a ballet studio, nor do they know that they have unexpectedly signed up for Joan’s endless scrutiny of their potential and drive. She can’t help it. Some part of her, however small, still believes that there is a science that can be worked out to determine a dancer’s career trajectory based off those early glimmers of hope and chance. If she can quantify the ways in which a dancer can be successful, she can pass the formula on to her students and teach them how to do something in the ballet world that lasts beyond their time gracing a stage. 

Despite being in her mid-fifties and having danced professionally well into her late forties, Joan doesn’t feel many aches and pains on the day to day basis, like many of her colleagues. She knows she is lucky, that she danced so long and had so much say in what she danced and who with. She is lucky she can still put her boots on and rise up to her toes, defying gravity. Many dancers she grew up with find themselves permanenty hobbled from the abuse they put their bodies through. For some reason, Joan’s body has only ever soaked the pain in to make her stronger. But, she knows her weakness wasn’t her body - but the thoughts inside her head that still swirl up when the cold wind of reality blows through. 

Joan can remember Arie waving his hand around this very studio, the coffee cup he had gripped between two fingers sloshing over his nails and down his wrist and saying, in his still slightly affected Dutch accent, this is all yours, Joany. Take it. How old had she been then? Thirty? Thirty two? However old, she had still felt the itch beneath her feet to keep moving. She didn’t resent Arie, no, he had given her everything, but she was thirsty and young and still had all ten toes on earth and she wanted to be out there in a way this regional company was not. Years later, when she returned to have her version of settled down, Joan appreciated what Arie had built. Dedicated, passionate audiences that flocked from all over the state to support the ballet. A thriving partnership with the state’s orchestra - so that they could bring live music to the stage with their ballets. A company that was small, but mighty, taking on ballets that other, larger companies found too challenging to conquer. For close to fifteen years now, Joan has tried her best to foster what Arie taught her in this new generation of young dancers. As her own career had slowly faded, Joan had watched vibrantly talented dancers take the stage and dance the roles she had first coveted, then performed, and finally came full circle to set on someone else. She had watched them grow and develop, and then some go elsewhere to be, just as she had once wished to. 

There was a silence slowly creeping to the doorway of the studio as her dancers exited the building into the evening air. She lets the silence fill her lungs and expels a breath. She customarily waits twenty minutes after the last voice fades to go through the halls shutting the studio down for the evening. Glancing at the clock, she realizes she’s lost ten minutes already, staring into the blank room, remembering. Arie would scold her, say if you’ve stopped moving, Joaney, you’re dead! It wasn’t until after he was gone that Joan realized how deeply that regularly saying on his had sunk into her bones.

Gathering up her belongings from around the room (water bottle, Thera-band, Airpods, discarded technique shoes), she packs her bag and prepares to leave for the evening. She feels the melancholy against the back of her eyelids, as it always does when she’s thought about Arie for too long. The grief of losing him has faded, just as her therapist had said it would, but it is also always waiting in the shadows to pounce on her. I don’t want to cry again tonight, she thinks, sliding her pointe shoes off her feet and adding them to her bag. On go her socks, then her practical sneakers. She had worn heels or flats for years, clomping in and out of the studio like she was going somewhere to see somebody - but the tennis shoes are her concession to growing older. Her feet just simply feel better when she has them on. To distract herself from the grief she feels welling up in her throat, she hurries out of the studio, bags clutched in her arms as she flips the lights off and locks the door. After a quick check of the bathrooms and dressing room to ensure there’s no lingering daisies, she locks the door and enters the building’s elevator, exits through the large wrought-iron double doors, and steps into the crisp early autumn night.