When I was 14, I told my father I wanted to join an art school to study dance and become a dancer.
He, with his then 30+ years as a theatre professional, had watched 100s of dancers go through the gruelling process of training to become a professional dancer by the age of 18, frequently not make it, & struggle to live a stable & fulfilling life without the guarantee of a salary or benefits. And those who DID make it were left with damaged & deteriorating bodies before they were 35, which they had to nurse through the later years of their life with damaged tendons, overworked muscles, and severely damaged feet.
For these reasons, he didn't want me following my dream of becoming a dancer, & talked me out of the career path.
He was being a good father to think this way, & I AM happy with my degrees & only partially deteriorating body - although I doubt my life is no more stable having gone into a different area of the arts.
What this photo series tells me is that it's NEVER too late to pursue your dream. I will never be a fully-fledged professional dancer, which I still feel I was supposed to be, but I am a dancer who knows the joys of movement, the thrill of the stage, & the meditative practice of filling my whole body with music, letting the energy vibrate inside me before throwing it out with all the energy my heart, soul, mind, body & spirit possess for the world or no one to feel & witness.
I may never be the dancer to those who put a person's value in the status of LinkedIn or my CV. But I am a dancer in my mind, body & soul, which only I can define, & can't be altered, damaged, or taken away.
Whatever your artistic dream may be, whether you're doing it now or dreaming it up, know it's never too late to be the creative you always dreamed of being.
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