Ballet mothers!

My 4 year old son has been in preschool ballet for the school year. He is the only boy in a class of 8 sweet little tu-tu'ed girls. He loves to dance, sing, and perform in all ways possible...much like myself. So I thought I would try him in dance to see if he enjoyed it and not surprisingly, he loves it.

I take him to the dance studio once a week, leave him to have fun, and I go off to run some errands with the baby. When I pick him up he is happy and glowing. The interaction I have with the other mothers is minimal and casual, as one would expect. We don't see each other often or for very long so there is not really time to say much beyond the odd comment.

Usually when we arrive and everyone is waiting for the class to start, my son chases all the little girls around, pretending to be a dinosaur or some other prehistoric monster and they squeal and shriek with delight. If I ask him to slow down or stop for a breath, one girl or another will inevitably creep back up to him, egging him on to chase them again. They are precious and he adores them all. As they do him.

The mothers however, are a different story altogether. These are ballet mothers.

It has only been recently that I really could see them for what they are. With this being final rehearsal week and then the big performance weekend for the entire dance school, we began spending alot more time together. And I soon found out what exactly a ballet mother was all about.

It soon became apparant that running, screaming and shrieking in delighted PLAY was completely frowned upon by these mothers. They did not smile as their daughters tried to hide and run from the dinosaur boy. They did not say "awww" when he would catch one and hug them or tickle them. No, but what they did say alot was, "Stop it!" "Settle down!" "No running!" "No screaming!" "This is not the place for that!" "If you don't stop it, you can't dance today!"

I felt so sorry for these sweet little girls who just wanted to have fun! Yet because the movement of active children racing about, and the "noise" of their excited playing bothered these mothers, they put a stop to it. Whatever happened to putting your own discomfort aside so your children can have a good time? I also felt these stiff mothers were trying to uphold a behaviour standard or image amongst each other. Even my casual comments of, "oh they are having so much fun!" or "aren't they cute, noisy ha ha, but that's kids, right?" were not responded to in kind. I felt like a lone outcast with an unruly child, or so their icy stares proclaimed him silently.

Once dress rehearsals and performance time came, it got even worse. In the dressing room, my boy wanted to make forts under the tables, chase, and run and still have fun...basically just be a boy....be a kid! I continued to receive cold shoulder treatment, hostile looks and some mothers even went so far as to snarl at me, "Can you keep him away from her? She doesn't like that!" Hmm, that's funny, I would think, since when mother was not looking, the little ballerina who "doesn't like that" was wrestling with him and teasing him into another game of chase! I would just sigh and kindly speak to my boy once again and ask him to please not touch anyone, not poke, pinch or tickle and especially don't touch anyone's hair! All the mothers had spent ages hairspraying and pinning up their little ballerinas hair into perfectly coiffed and tight buns, so they practically had heart attacks when this little boy just looking to have fun would run by and try and poke one of these buns! Isn't that what boys do though? And I noticed many a girl smile or start to giggle at this before their mother noticed. But in the mothers' eyes, the only problem in the room was my boy and he was destroying their daughters' perfect poise.

Give me a break! I had seen all of these girls stripped of that poise that the mothers insisted upon and play with him as children should! Dance is supposed to be a fun activity, not a restrained and restricted one!

I was even given a "talking to" from one extra fierce mother who said there had been numerous complaints about my boy and he had to stop this behaviour right away as he was frightening and hurting many of the girls! I apologized and demurely said I would do my best to see he did not hurt anyone. This was so ridiculous because I always watched him like a hawk (unlike the other mothers who were too busy chatting or gossiping to watch their children closely!) and I knew for sure that any so-called "hurting" was merely the same rough play they had always engaged in.

To be fair, there were a couple of mothers who did lighten up during the course of the show weekend, and spoke a little more friendly to me. One mother even told me she did not like this dance school and was hoping not to bring her daughter back in the Fall. Well, I liked the school alot....the teachers are warm and caring and they make it fun for the children. It is the level of unfriendliness and severity given out from the mothers that spoil it so much.

I am sure these mothers would behave this way with their children in whatever event or sport or public outing they were in....tense, terse and restrained. I see that all the time and always know it is the problem of the parent, not of the child. The child just wants to be a kid....but the parent refuses to allow them their natural enthusiasm or energy to burst forth in any kind of public setting or social gathering. These are the parents' own fears and issues that their child might stand out or be viewed as less than conforming to "proper behaviour" but honestly, if it is not hurting anyone else, then why be so restrictive? Children love to shriek and scream but because adults don't do that and other adults might not like it, these enforcements are placed on the children. And not just from vocal noise but from any large physical movements too. As these children grow, they lose their natural exuberance and become a "stiffer" person than maybe they would have been, had they not been held back from exhibiting their energy and zest for life so much.

But then again, maybe that is exactly what these ballet mothers want from their daughters....stiff little carbon copies of themselves.