Most of you know that I use to be a dancer. Not a dancer as in a stripper. A dancer as in a college danceteam member. Just to clarify for all of you who may have been thinking dancer meant pole dancer. Although I think most of my readers are women so I probably don’t even need to clarify. ha! But just to make sure you believe me….here is proof:

SALUKI SHAKERS 2003

After my four years on the SIU Dance Team I decided I wasn’t ready to hang up my dancing shoes just quite yet so I decided to do some coaching for my high school’s pom squad.  I was hired along side another coach so there were actually 2 of us.

Even though I LOVED getting to know all the girls…it was very stressful at times. Dealing with the parents was the worst part! Man, remind me to never call up Parker’s football coach when he’s in High School and rip them a new a-hole for not playing him (of course, I am sure I won’t have to anyway since he will be a starter). 🙂

Not only that, but the other coach and I seemed to have our fair share of differences. See, I was hard core….”nazi” as they called me because I came from competitive team….and she was “nice as pie” as I like to say. She actually tried to be more of their friend than their coach. Which is fine and all if you aren’t trying to win a State Championship. Anyway, long story short, I decided that the stress wasn’t worth it to me and I officially threw in my dancing shoes the next year.

I did miss the girls terribly! Most of them were very sweet and had tons of potential. Every once in a while I will run in to one of them here in town, but not very often. Not too long ago (when my gpa passed to be exact), I received the sweetest email from one of my old pom squad members. Here is what she wrote:

Mandy–
You may not even remember me, but I was on the pom squad my sophomore year,that one year that you coached us. I came across your blog a couple of months ago on myspace or something, so I’m totally not a creeper or anything :).  Anyway, I have been wanting to tell you this for a long time, and I thought that maybe right now you would need a little cheering up.  I just wanted to tell you that the year you coached us was the best year of poms, and you did way more for us than you probably even know! You don’t know how many times Natalie and I looked back on that season and missed it so much! Your coaching us was the best thing that could have ever happened, and I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciated you.  I know it was hard for you because you were going to get married soon and your fiancee was in the military, and I just wanted to say that I was happy you chose to help us! Thank you so much!

Sarah

I can not tell you how much it meant to me to receive this email! I often wondered how the girls felt about me? Was I too mean? Did they see that even though I was strict I was only trying to help them better their dance abilities? Did they realize that even though I was stearn on the outside…I adored each one of them? Now I know there was at least one girl who saw my vision!

Thank you Sarah for the email! I appreciate it like you will never know!