Arms Out Like Wings: Recent Episodes
Glenda Taylor
Arms Out Like Wings is an anecdotal memoir about my seven years spent in a ballet boarding school from 1969 to 1976 aged nine to seventeen. A ‘Pygmalion-esque’ story that takes me from my crowded, loving council house home of siblings, cockney, lorry driver Dad and Italian seamstress Mother, to a Rolls Royce gliding through London, tinkling piano music in corridors and marquees on the lawn. This book will give you an insight into a young ballet dancers life. The initial spark, training, literal blood sweat and tears, close friendships, pranks, pain, disappointment, injury, romance and sacrifices.
The very beginning of my story. Visit our family home and the warm chaos within. Meet my Mum, Dad, brother and sisters. A glimpse into life in the 1960's.
Things start to scale up when I go to Corona Stage School. I find a dance mentor and Dad becomes a grumpy hero.
My Dad organises my secret audition for a professional Ballet School in East Grinstead. I then meet another influential lady in my life whilst I Polka in the biggest studio I have ever seen.
My Italian family think I have been kidnapped, my Dad tells them where to go whilst I get turned down for a grant.
A rather tense car ride to my new Ballet School. My little sister playing 'rag doll' with me, my brother giving me a whole Ten Shilling note and my mother sobbing and smoking like she would use every cigarette in Surrey. Meeting 'Nursey' and finding out that trendy, short skirts were useless for galloping like a horse around a dance studio.
Crisp and formal bedding, lights out and growing home sickness with an unusual approach to bed time.
Girls behaving 'sort of badly' at night. Strange rituals involving absent Nursey and Glito . . . . .
Evenings at a girls Ballet School for borders. Midnight games, kissing practise 'girl on girl', crushes, making cheese from yoghurts and eventually sleep. . . .
Strange latin phrases, weekend visits to my family and cuddling my sister. Dancing on the staircase.
Being at a Ballet School involves many rituals. You also have to know your place in the hierarchy. This is where Aprons came in. Your apron and National Skirts were part of you. Life evolved around the seamstress who inhabited a cramped and warm space at the top of the school, a sort of haven for me. . . .
It seems young ballet dancers need to learn about washing tights with fabric softener and how to put clothes on in a hurry.
My 'Pygmalion' moment when I learn to 'speak posh', learn how to read & write at last and secret moments with my parents and baby sister Gaynor in the Tuck Box room.
We loved Fire Drills which were always so exciting and after lights out. Nothing however prepared us for performing tap dance routines with John Noakes and Roy Castle on our own theatre.
This is the one about the incredibly ethereal lady who inhabited our Blue Pond and school corridors at night. Also the strange powers of levitation at our fingertips.
I discover the agony and ecstasy of dancing in pointe shoes. These were of course so much more than shoes. Every pair of every girls pointe shoes was individual to them.
Exams are a constant in life when training to be a Ballet Dancer. Major Exams are something else though and were treated with reverence. They involved more expemditure by my parents and a trip to London!
Friendships formed in boarding school can last for ever, such is the bond you have after growing up together.
Miss Marsh was the 'Queen' of the Ballet School. A total character with make-up, hair and clothes creating a terrifying vision that we worshipped and curtseyed every time she passed by.
Christmas was a magical time at the school. One Christmas remains in my memory for all sorts of reasons . . .
We sooo looked forward to the end of term. It meant Trunks & Apple Pie Beds and then home sweet home
Time to move up to a new Dorm. Lifetime friendships begin to take shape. No more Nursey in charge but now we had to deal with Matron herself. . .
Becoming independent, escaping out of the school grounds undercover of bushes. Home clothes and doing our own laundry.
An eclectic array of teachers covering subjects from English language to stage make-up.
Becoming fluent in the language of ballet. Learning Benesh notation. Music in the corridors. Flu epidemic gets us all sent home.
Feeling really grown up and rearing little bird. Heart throbs on the wall. No room to swing a cat. Bottom shaping games!
Knocked over by a car and breaking a leg causing a pause in career & training. What seems like endless time in hospital. Family sacrifices.
Physiotherapy proves to be a lovely distraction in the guise of two Swedish physiotherapists. Time in hospital coming to an end and the dreaded calliper.
Home after three months in hospital and not feeling as happy as I thought I would. Back to school at last to resume ballet life.
Best new dorm ever. Being treated like adults. visits by local boys via windows. Anorexia too close for comfort.
Staying on for a year as a student is full of incident. Then we have the arrival of vivacious Madame Bonitto who shakes up the school.
Late night conversations with the powers that be make me feel less certain of my future.