Summer Expectations

For seven years, my life was consumed by sequins, tights, leotards, bobby pins, and hair spray. From the time my daughter was in 2nd grade until she was in 8th when the pandemic closed the world down, my daughter, Kate, danced competitively. Just to be clear here–I am not your quintessential dance mom. I would have been much better suited to be a sports mom, but somehow my daughter found herself in the world of dance. Ugh. It was a very busy, time-consuming lifestyle that involved her spending 20+ hours a week at the dance studio throughout the school year, regional competitions in the spring, a week of recitals, and national competition in the summer. She would have two weeks off at Christmas, a week off for Spring Break, two weeks off after recital, and then a few weeks off after nationals before the new season started. It was exhausting, all-encompassing, and expensive! We didn’t have much time for anything extra beyond dance. Fun-filled summer adventures were never on our agenda because dance filled our agenda. Now that Kate has chosen not to dance, we have time again, and what I’ve noticed is that there is an incredibly unrealistic push from our culture today to fill all that free time! Open Pinterest, turn on the tv, get on any social media platform, and you are inevitably inundated with posts, advertisements, articles, pictures, and mom experts who are declaring that since we only have 18 summers with our kids, we have to make them these amazing, adventure-filled, exceptionally full experiences.