Competition

Saturday, December 9th - The day our hard work will be tested.

This weekend brings our annual dance competition that we hold right at our high school. Its the first competition of the season, the first time we get to see who we are against, the first time the judges will see what we are bringing to this dance season.

Of course, I am nervous, just like any other normal athlete would be participating in any type of competition, but this year is different. It's my senior year. The last year to make it to state, to place in the top rankings, and to just prove to myself that I can do it and "leave it on the dance floor."

Usually around this time, my stress levels rise drastically above where they should be, due to the amount of worries of what could possibly go wrong during any of our dances. Will everyone stay sharp the entire time? What if someone drops a pom? Will everyone keep their facials throughout the routine?

These worries, among others, won't ever go away, no matter how good or bad our team becomes. But this year, the bond I share with the other seven girls on my team is stronger than ever before, which plays a huge role in our dances. Good relationships means trust, which brings unity, or better known as "togetherness," which is what makes dances win. This bond makes me feel 1000000 times more confident going into this weekend. I know that the girls have my back, just like I have theirs.

In my last post, I explained what it took to make up one of our competition dances. On Saturday, that pom routine, along with a jazz dance and my solo, will be put on the floor, and I have never been so excited. If you don't know the difference between all the different styles of dance, and if you have the time/interest to understand them more, click here for an in depth explanation.

Team dinner at Steak-N-Shake before a long 8-hour practice the next day!

We have been practicing nonstop, in the mornings, after school everyday, and even on weekends. This competition gives us a chance to prove to ourselves that all of our sore muscles, early mornings, sweat, and hard work was worth it. Its a lot of pressure, but in my opinion, that's the best part.

Three years ago, I never would have thought that I would be competing with a solo. Being judged individually, let alone dancing by yourself in front a large group of people, takes a lot of confidence within yourself and your dancing, something I did not have when I started high school. But over the years, I have grown up and matured, and in a few days, I will be performing a "sassy jazz" solo in front of a gym full of people who are (for the most part) very knowledgable in the difference between a good and a bad dancer.

I don't know what the results will be. If we don't do well, I'll be upset, just like anyone would. But no matter what, I'll know that all of us gave it our all, and that is the only thing we can do. I am proud of my team and how far we've come, and I am excited for this long competition season we have ahead of us.

Behind the Dances

When someone watches any dance, whether it is a performance at a football game or on a stage for a huge audience, they usually never consider how much work and effort went into actually creating what is in front of them. Many teams hire a professional choreographer to create their dances, but our high school team unfortunately doesn't get that luxury.

Due to this, the other captains and I spend a lot of our time on the weekends choreographing new dances for upcoming performances. This past weekend in particular, the task on hand was to create one of our varsity dances that we would be competing with at upcoming competitions in the winter.

We knew going into our choreography session that we would have a long and tiring journey before we were finally able to complete a dance that would be acceptable to us, our coach, and eventually the judges. There's always so much to think about - visuals, formations, tricks, the storyline - it all has to be perfect. Of course, there's no way of knowing beforehand what the judges want, which is why there are multiple competitions before the final state competition in February, but still, the entire choreography process is like a guessing game. Do we have enough tricks in our dance? Do we have too many? Are the judges going to understand this part? Does this look stupid?

Of course, these sessions can sometimes be fun, especially considering the friendships I share with my fellow choreographers, but unfortunately, there are times when I become tempted to fall on the ground and give up. That's dramatic, but really, the entire process is a headache.

We decided that Friday night was the night we were going to get a major chunk of the dance done. After school, we drove straight to my house, went down to the basement (my sisters and I have a mini dance studio there), and got down to business. We worked and worked, constantly questioning our moves and ideas, wondering if there was anyway we could possibly make them better.

It wasn't until 7:00 pm when we hit a road block with our ideas and decided that we needed a break. We had been going at it for too long without stopping, so focused to the point that we didn't realize we were hungry. Not hungry, but hangry. We all started to get mad and fight over what should get put in the dance, so we decided that we needed time to breath and get some food.

After grabbing a quick dinner, we were refreshed and ready to keep pushing. As the night went on, our minds and bodies grew more and more tired. At about 10:30 pm, we hit that slap happy phase of tiredness. We couldn't be serious and get anything done because at that point, everything was funny to us. At 11:00 pm, we called it quits and decided to meet up again on Sunday.

We decided on 7:00 am on Sunday. Why so early? Who knows, but the point is that we wanted to get as much of the dance done as possible before we had to teach it to the team the following week.

It was a long morning, but we finished a lot of the dance. Not all, but a large chunk, which is good progress. All in all, we ended up spending 10 hours choreographing last weekend, and of course the dance still isn't finished.

Yeah, we spent hours on a dance that definitely isn't perfect, but thats why we go to multiple regional competitions. If the judges' comments come back saying that we look like trash, our team moves on and fixes what needs to be fixed. Some people ask us why the heck we do this to ourselves.

We do it because it's what we are used to, it's our lives. We are okay with missing a fun night out with friends to work hard on something we love. Even though we are definitely a little crazy, we are dedicated to our team, and we do not ever want to let them down.

The many times I have gone through this process for each and every dance we perform has taught me one thing: nothing comes easy, and even if you give 100% of your effort, nothing will be perfect; someone will always be there to criticize you and knock you down. The important thing is that you get right back up and try even harder next time.

This past year at STATE!

Homecoming Week

For most people, homecoming week is the week of festivities and fun to pump up the football players for the upcoming game that Friday, or even the week before the annual school dance. For the Eaglettes, it's even more than just that.

This year's homecoming week was the most stressful I have ever experienced in all of my four years on the team, but it was also one of the best, in my opinion at least. Whether it was because it is my senior year on the team or the students were just more enthusiastic about homecoming in general, this year's homecoming week exceeded all of my expectations that I had formed from past years.

The week started off stressful. We had only three days to perfect two routines that would be performed on Friday, one at the pep rally and the other during halftime at the football game. Anxiety levels were high in everyone because we knew that these two dances would be watched by the largest audience we had ever had this season, and we didn't want to disappoint.

Monday's practice was rough, as it is every year during homecoming week. The two hours of practice that day consisted of running the dances, cleaning individual sections, and then running the dances again. It was exhausting, but I, as well as the others on my team, realize that good dances don't come from easy practices. On Tuesday, the dance was finally coming together, and on Wednesday, I was feeling pretty confident about what was to come on Friday.

I would say that Thursday was our "fun day." After three days of backbreaking practices, our legs were ready to fall off due to how many jumps and turns we did in such a short period of time. We were lucky enough to get a break on Thursday, due to the parade that followed the school day.


On Thursday morning, a memory on Facebook popped up in my notifications. After clicking and opening the memory, I became very sad with what I saw. It was a picture of me and the girls I have danced with all throughout middle school and high school at the homecoming parade of our first year on the middle school dance team. Even though this picture was six years ago, I feel like it was just yesterday. After seeing that photo, I realized that this year would be my last year in the parade. In addition to that, this year would be my last year dancing with my fellow captain and best friend, Lydia (pictured in the center). This day was supposed to be happy, not full of depressing "last times" that I would never be able to experience again.


After I saw that, I decided to try and make this year the best parade yet, not only for me, but for all of the girls on my team.

The end of the parade meant the end of our "fun day", which also meant the beginning of our most stressful day yet: game day. School on Friday was honestly a joke for me because of the constant nerves and anxiety I was feeling leading up to the pep rally. Even though I knew the dance frontwards and backwards and could easily do it in my sleep after all of the practicing we did leading up to that day, I still ran the dance in my head over and over again throughout all of my classes. I didn't want to mess up because the whole school would be there to witness it. I was sweaty all day, probably due to the amount of nerves I was feeling.

When I got dismissed from class to get ready for the pep assembly, I ran down to my coaches room, frantically changed, and threw on some red lipstick (something essential for dance performances, in my opinion). My team ran down to the gym, not even getting time to stretch, which didn't even matter because of the amount of adrenaline we were about to have in just a few moments.

All four grade levels arrived in the gym, and I was honestly shocked at how many people there were sitting around me. I didn't even think that there were that many people in our school! After it was announced that it was our turn to perform, I gave my team a reassuring smile and led them onto the gym floor. Before I knew it, we were dancing.

Here's the thing with dance performances: stuff happens. But when things occur, most dancers are trained to keep going, even when someone breaks their ankle on stage or if a costume falls off. This time, the music stopped halfway through the routine, but we did what our coach has taught us since day one: keep going. Yes, it was embarrassing, and yes, I wanted to kill whoever caused our music to shut off, but looking back, it really wasn't as bad as I thought. The school had our backs and clapped us through to the end of the performance, which was something that doesn't always happen in dance.
What mattered most to us was that our coach was pleased with the performance, something that very rarely happens. Here is a clip of the pep rally dance, which includes the moment when the music stops.

After the pep rally, we preceded back to the room to get ready for the game and practice our halftime performance just a few more times before the "real deal", as my coach would call it. When I and coach decided that the dance was up to our standards, our team rushed to the annual homecoming pot luck with our families. After getting stuffed with hotdogs, chips, and cookies, we moved on to the football game.

The first half of the varsity game seemed like it went on forever. As the time on the clock ran out, I got more and more butterflies in my stomach. When it was almost time to get in line to perform, I circled up my team and did the only thing that would help them in that moment: pump them up. Looking at Lydia, I realized that it was our last time performing at a homecoming game, something that may not seem as big as a deal to others as it is to us.

Standing in front of the field and waiting for the band to finish their performance, I felt the goosebumps rise up on my arms and legs. It wasn't even cold; the air was actually a little humid compared to games from previous years. But the goosebumps weren't caused by the weather, they were caused by the tension I was feeling in that moment.

Everything is a blur for me from that point on, just as it always is every time I perform. Before I knew it, we were walking off the field while the crowd cheered for our performance. Here is a clip from our performance.

Homecoming week was over, and as stressful as it was, I would do it over again in a heartbeat. I realize that my last homecoming was only one of the first lasts I will be experiencing this season, which sucks, but I guess life goes on.

About Me

My name is Sarah Carlson, and I am a senior in high school. I am fortunate enough to have two loving parents, as well as two younger sisters. As we grew up together, our parents forced us to try many different sports, but all three of us always knew deep down that our heart was with dance. We push each other to get better everyday, but at the same time, we are each other's biggest fans.


As I grow into an adult and become more serious about the sport I love, I realize more how big of a part it is in my life. Dancing is something that I have grown up doing, whether it is at my dance studio, on my school team, or just at home by myself.

Without dance, who would I be? My entire life, I have spent hours upon hours working as hard as I can to be the best dancer that I could possibly be. To be completely honest, I don't know where I would be if I didn't have dance to turn to. When I'm bored, I dance. When I'm happy, I dance. When I need a shoulder to cry on, I turn to my dance family, the people I spend hours with every week.

After this final year in high school, dance will not be as big of a part of my life as it is now. I am going to miss it, but I will always have the memories of all the hard work I have put in, as well as all of the accomplishments I have made with the people closest to me. I am who I am today because of these memories, and I want to be able to cherish them for the rest of my life.