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As I gaze out my plane window of my flight home, I find my mind asking the question of what this word truly means: home. I am at the crossroads where this word's significance becomes more important and less specific each day, where home is more a state of mind than a location. And what a perfect metaphor, the plane, neither staying nor going, ending or beginning. I am flying high on my way home.
Last year this trip made me realize that I wanted to live in New York, this trip, I realize that I know I need to be there. There is something so eloquent about synthesizing a future of small apartments, macaroni and cheese, and scarce heat. To me it represents dreams on their way to truth. To live in this city of grandeur, to experience life as a dancer in New York, deeply pulls my heart strings.
I am incredibly grateful to be given this opportunity to experience New York City first hand. From watching one of my favorite dancers, with whom I keep an email correspondence, to performing for high school students and meeting with critics, choreographers, and dance managers, there are not enough words to describe the magnitude of influence of taking a trip such as this.
It brings tears to my eyes, remembering being approached by a young girl after our performance at Our Children's Foundation in Harlem. A girl, who is a young dancer, asking me, ME, a question. And I, imparting my knowledge and experience into her hands. This was perhaps the highlight of my trip; I can still remember looking into her eyes, and being pulled into the glimmer. A glimmer that we all have, of dreams, of love, of passion.
One incredible moment followed the next. We met with the chief dance critic of the New York Times, a significant engagement in which not all dancers get to partake. I myself have always loved to write. Aside from dance, writing is my way of emoting. I enjoy feeling the words pour from my mind through my fingertips. So of course I had a multitude of questions for this man. As he began to describe the way he wrote, or how at a young age he would go home and write "letters" after each dance performance viewed, I became slightly nauseated with the notion that I felt as though he was describing me. It was an out-of-body experience, hearing my thoughts through another's mouth, one with such knowledge and articulation; whose prose sounded like poetry. A successful man, who, like myself, felt that the more he typed into a white computer screen, the deeper his thoughts ran.
I also had the opportunity to tour some beautiful art galleries. Having studied art history, until last week, I have not ever viewed a masterpiece first hand. Being a dance artist, there was an unmistakable visceral quality in standing next to work by Picasso, van Gogh, and Matisse, to name a few. I was brought to tears by Wyeth's "Christina's World", a piece I would not have ever thought to elicit this response, her delicate hairs being swept briskly with the passing wind as she gazed helplessly to the distance.
I remember vividly, lying down in Central Park, thinking, I could be here. Skipping rocks across the Hudson, playing with this as my life. Underground in the subway, feeling comfortable; strangely, I could have stayed there forever. Walking at night, staring up at the stars of skyscrapers, my mind has one thought; I am home.
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