Dancing is not something that’s in my blood, but instead is something that has been engrained into my very being. For the past seventeen years dance has become one of the biggest parts of my life. I may dance the dance, but in reality the dance is dancing me. When you commit to something entirely no matter how good or bad you are it, it becomes part of you, even when you give it up. However my story isn’t about giving up, it’s about dedication and pulling through no matter the cost. Dance is not just something I’m literate it in, it’s something I live, it’s something that hurt me, but most importantly it’s something I’m committed to no matter what.
Barely seventeen, regional dance competition, crying while smiling, not my first injury on the dance floor and certainly not my last. The doctors tell me I’ve torn my meniscus, to take it easy. Two months later and my knee has popped out in the middle of my number, that doesn’t stop me, pop it back in and get back on stage. Quitting is not an option; it’s never an option. Nationals are over and it’s into my very first knee surgery I go. It takes longer than it should. When I finally wake up from the anesthesia they tell me the news, your ACL is gone but your meniscus is healing, there’s talk of more physical therapy and another surgery, but the only that sticks out in my mind is no more dancing. That is not an option. One more year of pain, dance shoes, costumes and stages. Eighteen, another surgery, new ACL, no more medial meniscus, it’s a win-lose. Six months later, back to dance.
Dedication is something I’m familiar with, but it’s dedication to dance that is something I live. Broken bones, sprained ankles, torn ligaments, nothing can keep me away. It is this intense dedication that enables me to become literate in dance. It separates me from those who dance just to dance and those who are forced to. It puts me, not where this would be a professional career, but in a place where dance terminology, such as plie` and arabesque, become an everyday thing for me. I’m literate in dance, and because of that, I am literate in dedication.
Barely seventeen, regional dance competition, crying while smiling, not my first injury on the dance floor and certainly not my last. The doctors tell me I’ve torn my meniscus, to take it easy. Two months later and my knee has popped out in the middle of my number, that doesn’t stop me, pop it back in and get back on stage. Quitting is not an option; it’s never an option. Nationals are over and it’s into my very first knee surgery I go. It takes longer than it should. When I finally wake up from the anesthesia they tell me the news, your ACL is gone but your meniscus is healing, there’s talk of more physical therapy and another surgery, but the only that sticks out in my mind is no more dancing. That is not an option. One more year of pain, dance shoes, costumes and stages. Eighteen, another surgery, new ACL, no more medial meniscus, it’s a win-lose. Six months later, back to dance.
Dedication is something I’m familiar with, but it’s dedication to dance that is something I live. Broken bones, sprained ankles, torn ligaments, nothing can keep me away. It is this intense dedication that enables me to become literate in dance. It separates me from those who dance just to dance and those who are forced to. It puts me, not where this would be a professional career, but in a place where dance terminology, such as plie` and arabesque, become an everyday thing for me. I’m literate in dance, and because of that, I am literate in dedication.
1. McCloud states that a/an __________________ “any image used to represent a person, place, thing or idea.”
a. cartoon
b. icon
c. visual argument
d. none of the above
2. According to McCloud, ______________ ________________ “are all digital comics in a technical sense, but many are still no more than ‘repurposed’ print at heart.”
a. online comics
b. digital comics
c. printed comics
d. none of the above
Work Cited
1. Handa, Carolyn. Visual Rhetoric in a Digital World. (Excerpt: McCloud, Scott. The Vocabulary of Comics.)
2. McCloud, Scott. Reinventing Comics: How Imagination and Technology Are Revolutionizing an Art Form. 1st ed. Harpercollins, 2000. 200 - 241.
3. Villanueva, Victor. Bootstraps: From an American Academic of Color. Urbana, IL: NCTE. 34-50
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