Adulting & a Met Opera Audition

Daya sure had a day today!

I might have to remind her of today and how amazing it was and how it showed how amazing she is.

****** 

We had a really good chat in the morning, just about how she's doing with some financial stuff.

She is doing extraordinarily well.  

Although she was not thinking this at all, I definitely see it and I put things in perspective for her.

In some ways, she is- and kind of always has been- ahead of her peers in basic life skills.

Unfortunately that does create a social gap for her.

It'll close as everyone gets older.

She asked me to keep something for her, to help her manage her head, and I said no.

It's the kind of thing where maybe a lot of moms would say yes and do it, because it would be helpful short-term, and it would have no impact on me at all.

But I said no.

And this is important because if I said yes and took a difficulty away, she would not learn how to keep her own balance.

She cannot depend on me-- or anyone else-- to keep her balance.

I will help with resources and structure to help her learn and keep balance, but she has to learn it.

And that takes some practice.  Now is the time in her life to do it, before she enters fully into the adult world.

Daya is a baby-adult right now.

She is an adult, yes, but I told her she has training wheels on.

I told her this is right and appropriate, she should have adult training wheels on, and she will for a few more years probably.

She got it.

And ultimately, because Daya is Daya, she won't settle for depending on anyone else for things she should do for herself. She requires autonomy; she won't stand for anything less.

I know this and I respect it, so I said no to a short-term comfort so she can learn and practice.

******

This afternoon, Daya auditioned for the Met Opera.

There is a 900-person waitlist to get an audition there.

The director of Juilliard Dance got her in.

So, Daya just stepped right over 900 people sitting on a waitlist hoping for a chance.

She told me all about the audition, which was really cool to hear about from her perspective.

There were 40 people in her group.

Of those 40, she said only about 10 would be seriously considered, and of those 10, 5 are Juilliard people.

Daya knows she blew everyone out of the room in that audition, and she knows why.

She does things differently, deliberately. They are small and subtle but make a huge difference.

She listens. She observes VERY carefully. 

She says a lot of people don't, which I find surprising at that level.

She said they'll say at the audition what they want to see.

They might say they want to see you as a dancer- which is more individual artistic interpretation, or they want to see technique.

They wanted to see technique.

Daya has technique out the wazoo and she knows it so she gave them technique.

She also knows she went to an audition where there are no available contracts right now.

That means all these people are auditioning (and waiting) for something with no openings.

It has something to do with a legal obligation to renew existing contracts.

But life changes and she said there is no way they don't offer her a contract at some point, but she doesn't really care whatever happens.

She said it was good for strangers to see her and it was a great experience.

*******

Before the audition, Daya went back to high school and took class at LaGuardia.

They like when she visits. 

It's also half a block from Juilliard- very convenient.

LaG Dance is a very, very special place and I'm glad she still has that access and support.

Tadej told me at winter dance showcase this year that they don't see enough of her. 

She took ballet class with the high school kids, which I think is fantastic because of the osmosis which is very real.  It's good for the kids to have her there as well. 

As it turned out, her good friend and mentor George from Manhattan Youth Ballet was subbing for the class, and he is a strong and good connection for her.  

Also he has connections from dancing at the Met Opera. Nice coincidence there.

Astoundingly, 6 out of 7 of my dance paintings from 2023 are still on display outside the dance office!!

My favorite one isn't there, maybe it sold.

They were supposed to be a fundraiser for LaG Dance.

I like that they are still there on display.

It's a nice feeling.

Tuna Wars

Daya is having a fight with the Juilliard cafeteria.

Over tuna fish and the container she puts it in.

It's a meal plan thing... they are charging her for having 2 meals instead of one.

This isn't good because Daya is going to run out of meals if she's being charged double every day.

She also has a points balance as part of the meal plan, because not everything in the cafeteria counts towards the meal plan. I don't fully understand it, my college meal plan was different- it covered everything, even non-food items in the Pratt convenience store. Like prismacolor markers.

Yes I got a set of them from my meal plan Freshman year and using the full meal plan was actually pretty difficult.

Not today at Juilliard....

I was in the office today and got this text, again:

I got tired of the whole thing.

It's stupid and petty and ridiculous.

And also that is NOT $8 worth of tuna and that's what I have zero tolerance for.

A double-size can at Costco comes out to $1.45/can, double the size of a standard grocery store can.

Yes the cafeteria is being stupid but they do have the authority to make stupid rules and also enforce them. Fighting is a losing situation and it's escalating.

So Daya is in conflict and also hungry, and that's not good so I went to Costco and spent $105 on six cases of tuna fish.

I wanted to know if she needed anything else.....

Yeah, the pantry doesn't magically restock, I thought this was funny.

So I got my camping backpack out and loaded it up with 72 cans of tuna and a few other things.

The trekking pole helps with the stairs in the subway.

Camping gear repurposed!

Inside the Juilliard dorm.....

The dorm floors are small and no one locks their doors.

I have been told it's the same key for every door anyhow, which I think is super weird but that's how Juilliard rolls. No one locks their dorm room.

I was not allowed to take pictures of Daya's room, but I asked if I could take a picture of the view and she said yes.

She also has some good signage:

Coming down the escalator from the dorm, we get a direct view of LaGuardia High School.

Back at LaG

My friend's daughter is a Junior dancer at LaGuardia, and junior projects were tonight.

I always like going back to LaG, even though I also don't miss Daya being in high school.

Mr Sinacori was there and it was nice to see him.

I sent pics of Juilliard and LaGuardia to Daya, just in case she's a little homesick.

(She probably is not homesick, I wouldn't be either in Italy.)

Juilliard Dorm

Ok so the Juilliard dorms are not, in fact, posh and luxurious like the one in yesterday's post.

Thank gooodness!

After being gone for three weeks, Daya came home for about 16 hours before moving into the dorms.

It's done, she's there.

The move-in was really easy and fast.

Apparently yesterday, the main move-in day, was hectic and crazy so it's probably good we did it this morning instead.

I gave Daya her Pebble-Painting and she likes it. :)

Even though she's basically still home, Daya wants to act like she's not so close to home.

(Even though she said already she's going to be stopping in...)

There are 3 bathrooms in Daya's section which are shared by 9 people.

Her room is small and cramped as dorm rooms are.

Her roommate seems pretty cool.

Now my job is to leave her alone unless she contacts me.

Oh, and pay for more dorm stuff that she needs.

She's got a great view.

Not as good as mine was my second year at Pratt, but still pretty good.

Her high school, LaGuardia, is in the bottom right of this picture.

She can actually look out the window and see into her high school dance classrooms on the top floor.

Daya's room is on the 26th floor.

Small common area for the floor

Large main common room area.

I'm glad she's there. It'll be a good experience to share close tight space with someone else and rough it.

It will also be so much easier for her this year without having to commute.

I'm so very deeply thankful it all worked out.

Juilliard Orientation

Welp, we are oriented.  

Well, I am at least, as much as Juilliard thinks I need to be, and I agree with them.

Daya has a whole upcoming week of stuff.

This is where my job as a parent is to back off.

Even though she is living at home, I'm basically going to act like she isn't, as if she was away.

We'll see each other when we see each other.

I'm not waiting up for her at night.

I'm not going to ask her how her day was anymore.

She can come to me if she needs to talk.

Its hard.

We have had inseparable intertwined lives for her whole life, especially since it has always been just the two of us.
And it's hard because Juilliard is just so incredible and exciting!

My parental intuition- even though I wish it was otherwise- is telling me to really back off and act like she isn't even here.  So I'm trusting that.

Her world is not my world, and that's ok.

**********

I have asked her to give me a courtesy text to let me know if she's staying out overnight, and if she comes home and the top lock is locked, she has to lock up completely for the night.

We will have to coordinate on shopping needs, because after this week- Juilliard is feeding all the Freshman all meals all week- I expect I'll be doing pretty much all of the food shopping.

She won't have time.

It's ok.

We already have shared shopping lists.

**********

I am extremely excited for Daya, for the world she is entering even more fully, for the education she will get, for the amazing and rare Juilliard experience she will have.

There are 20 Freshman dancers, 10 are boys.

There are 85 dancers total in the whole school.

It is the exact right place for her and I know she will thrive.

**********

Check out this AMAZING broke-college-kid-price for......... 2 boiled eggs.

I cannot even.

This should be illegal.

(also they are small eggs because large eggs are 80 calories.)

(I am currently paying around 20 cents an egg at costco, AND I boil them for free!)

LaGuardia right at the end of the block!

..... i cannot believe we are already out of LaG!

Pigeon contemplating The Juilliard School

It all feels so surreal.

Graduation!!

Daya graduated from high school today... I can't believe it.

The end of a long road.

There is a lot about it that is sad, but honestly I'm mostly relieved.
I'm sad that I'm so relieved.

This has been a hard road, high school has not been easy.

It is, however, ending well.

I got a visual accommodation seat in the third row, which was great and of course there was a big head literally right in front of me. Theaters are always so difficult for me, between my eyes and being 5 feet tall.  Getting that seat took more effort than it should have; the school repeatedly ignored my requests.  The AP of dance took care of it though.

So I'm sad to leave LaGuardia, I'm glad to leave LaGuardia, I'm sad this is the official end of Daya's childhood, and I'm also really happy about that. It's a real intense mishmash of everything.

Daya performed at graduation and I'll put the video link up when I upload it.

Here are pictures. I was so nervous for her performance... I sat next to Mr Smith who choreographed.... he was telling me the stage was really slippery. Daya did have to change a few things because of it, but it was beautiful.

Daya and Mr Steffa. I first told them to make faces showing how much they love each other.

Then I told them to be fake.

They are buds though, although Daya started tormenting Mr Steffa literally since auditions.

Ms Foote

Daya and Jonah, her performance partner.

We went out for sushi.

I gave Daya an Apple Watch.

Dinner was nice and there were some LaG vocal alums in the restaurant too.

After, we both felt like walking so we walked over the bridge about halfway home.

This was really, really nice- Daya talked to me about stuff and we had a really nice conversation. This might have been the best part of the day.

***********

Today is a "last" for me too.

Tomorrow I go into surgery prep for right cataract.

It is the last day of my life I will wear a hard contact lens in the right eye.

See how the light hitting my eyes is different? 

When I get my new implant that will be even again too.