First Place Preliminary Champs U12!
I have hoped to be able to write this for 4 years. Dancergirl has been competing in Irish Dance for 7 years, with the last 4 at championship level.
For the uninitiated, championships mean they dance three rounds, their scores are tallied at the end and there is one overall winner. There are two levels of championships: Preliminary and Open. It takes 2 firsts in prelims to get to open.
For 3 years dancergirl has competed and come away empty-handed. For perspective, they usually give trophies to the top 40 or 50%. She has not gotten one trophy until last November when she placed at regionals.
She has much more tenacity than I, particularly with the amount of work that goes into just being competitive much less being at the top.
Today, dancergirl made it to the top. It was not without drama, but she did it — overcame her nerves, overcame mistakes, and when her number was called it was for first place.
I immediately claimed my right as the insane parent to leap out of my seat with an “OMIGOSH I CAN’T BELIEVE IT!!!” blurting from my mouth which sent all of the parents sitting around me into paroxyms of laughter. Later they told me they couldn’t decide if her look of dazed happy shock was more fun than my utter momness. I’m glad they laughed or I would’ve run the risk of mortifying my victorious daughter.
There was drama, for sure. In the second round she had a “Sasha Cohen” moment where she mashed up her third round dance with her second round dance and did a hybrid step as a finale. No one knew, save Dancergirl and one judge who actually noticed. Her face didn’t give it away till afterwards, and then I couldn’t figure out if she was hurt or what – she wouldn’t talk to me.
Her teacher happened by and stopped to see how it was going, and the tears started flowing with 5 minutes to the third round. Teacher tells her to finish dancing first, cry later, and nail that third dance to the floor, which she did in spades. She heard the message and it paid off.
Despite the mistake, 2 of three judges placed her 1st in round 2. In fact, it was her strongest round of the three. Go figure. That win was sweet for her, so sweet it took her a few hours for it to even sink in that she’d actually done it.
As proud as I am of her, I didn’t write all of this just to brag. She teaches me lessons every day, and the one she hammers home on a daily basis is to NOT give up, to keep pushing, to let defeats turn to victory through the sweat of hard work, and most of all, to play on the team.
When I asked her what changed for her, she said it was two things: a) She was tired of finishing low and got mad about it; and b) She dances on a team, too and her teammates are younger and look up to her. Her team experience has been the opposite of her solo experience — she’s been on three teams that won regional championships.
She felt like she needed to set an example of hard work for the team, so she applied it across all of her dancing.
There are times when I hit a wall on something (work, projects, keeping my attention focused…) and feel so tempted to give in to the temptation to pack it in and call it a day. Then I look at my sweet daughter, sweating and tired after a 3 hour practice and tell myself that if she can keep at it, so can I.
She inspires me.
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