(Photo Credit Suzy Raskin)

By Shannon Rugani

I grew up in a small town known for its crystal blue lake surrounded by pristine Sierra mountains called Lake Tahoe. It’s a popular tourist destination, so when people find out that I grew up there I usually get the “people actually live there?” face. It was a fun place to grow up, but the grass always seemed greener elsewhere. 

On my fifth birthday, my parents excitedly enrolled me in a ballet class at a local dance studio. It didn’t go well. I cried – the entire time. The teacher told my parents not to bring me back unless I could get through a class without throwing a tantrum. 

In the meantime, I found my true love, music. I had a natural knack for what I called “making up” my own music, AKA composing. It was a way I could express myself freely. Despite my dislike of the single ballet lesson that I took, I loved the dancing around the house to music on the radio. As corny as this may sound, it was like my body BECAME the music. 

So, when I turned six, my parents decided to try ballet lessons again… This time it felt different. Something clicked. My body somehow knew what to do, and dancing along to music was magical. 

At seven, I had a definite plan for my life. So I wrote down a very concise and specific list of my dreams. 

#1. Ballerina 

#2. Actress 

#3. Singer (I still don’t know how I came up with this one because I didn’t “find-my-voice” until I was 19.) 

Looking back on that list, I must have subconsciously known that I couldn’t have accomplished any of those dreams in Lake Tahoe. That only became clearer as I excelled in my dancing. At 14, I left home to train with the San Francisco Ballet School and haven’t looked back. 

(I’m going to skimm my career highlights as this is NOT my biography.) 

#1. I danced professionally with the San Francisco Ballet for 11 years. (Check dream #1.) #2. I performed the lead on Broadway in the TONY Award winning musical, An American In Paris. (I will never forget the moment when the Director called me an “Actress”. I definitely called my mom afterwards to tell her to put a check-mark next to dream #2!) 

#3 Then I became a singer/songwriter under my stage name EMPRESS®. (I still have a long way to until I check off dream #3.) 

And I lived happily ever after. The End… 

JUST KIDDING!

As dreamy as it may sound, living my childhood dreams was really not as glamorous as one might imagine and definitely was not as effortless as it looks on paper. There were a lot of things that I didn’t consider when I was dreaming up my life at the ripe old age of seven. I didn’t know how much blood, sweat, tears and thick skin that it would take to become a ballerina and the sacrifice, dedication and persistence it would take to perform on Broadway. I was hoping to find happiness in accomplishing my dreams, yet I never felt satisfied when I finally “made it”. The grass was always greener somewhere else. 

I remember the day that I realized that I had grown out of my childhood dream of being a ballerina. I was sitting on the Opera House stage after a tough performance. It was just me, the ghostlight and a few bloody toes. I could barely see through my tears as I gazed out at the dim, empty theater. It had lost all of the magic and twinkle that it once had. I knew that it was time to officially check “ballet” off my list and move on… 

On Broadway the lights sure seemed brighter, but they too dimmed. I longed to be in control of my career, write my own story, sing my own songs and be myself onstage, not just a character in someone else’s play. 

I came full circle and turned to music, the ribbon that had weaved it’s way throughout my life. I finally felt like I was home. This seemed ironic. After all the years of striving to get to “the other side” that everything I ever wanted was here all along. 

This reminds me of a joke where two people on opposite sides of the river. One calls out, “How’d you get to the other side?” 

The other yells back, “You are on the other side!” 

You see, we all want to get to the “other side” and yet “our side” is exactly where we’re supposed to be. It’s healthy to have goals and dreams, but if we are always seeking bigger, brighter, faster, or, greener pastures, we will never feel truly satisfied. It’s time for us to appreciate our own patch of grass – no matter what shade of green it is.