Tap. Tap. Tap.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Theater has been a part of my life for almost as long as my memory extends. I was recently cast in a role that requires quite a bit of dancing. Not just group dance numbers - but solo dance numbers. Including a solo tap dance. I've never taken tap; never even donned tap shoes prior to a few weeks ago. I've been acting since I was four years old; I've done a fair amount of singing; but, a tap solo? I was frankly terrified. I have to admit: I questioned the casting. Why would the director give me this part? I thought. This is not my a role that emphasizes my strongest onstage assets. This is not the role I would assign myself.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

News came knocking two weeks ago; on the heels of the death of a dear friend, now there is the failing health of my grandmother. She fell several weeks ago, stayed with my parents in Michigan for awhile, then returned to her home in Toledo; then seemed to be slipping, and went to live with my aunt in Chicago; then, slipping further, was admitted to Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, Illinois - the hospital where I was born. Soon after being admitted to the hospital, she suffered a stroke.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Learning the basics of tap in one crash course, knowing I subsequently have to learn the actual choreography, and be ready to perform the routine confidently in front of an audience by month's end, is both exhilarating and nerve-wracking. The tap solo isn't my only dance in the show; though I've given up kickboxing during this rehearsal period, my muscles ache from practicing the dances over and over and over, trying to make my body accept that it needs to move in new ways.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Staying in touch with family, getting daily updates, hearing over and over the phrase two-steps-forward, one-step-back: this is part of my new routine. On top of working full-time in one office, part-time in another, while also teaching a night class at a local college, and rehearsing the show, is taxing enough; worrying about my grandmother, and my father, and my mother, and my brothers and sister and extended family... the routine only gets more complicated once we learn the basic steps. Fortunately, I have some good partners; a steady rhythm; and other things to think about, like learning choreography.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

So I've just about learned the dance. I still mess up, but of course, the main rule is: keep going. If you falter, if you get off-beat, if you miss a step - you just keep going. Sometimes I have to go back and re-learn the parts I thought I knew; and then other times, unexpectedly, my mind will be blank right up until my cue and then, without thought or hesitation, I am suddenly at the end of the dance, having remembered every step, hit every mark.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

I still worry about my family. I am far away, but never removed from them. I spoke to my grandmother on the phone the day before her most recent stroke; she joked about finding a boyfriend in the hospital. Unexpectedly, we laughed.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Sometimes we're cast in roles we wouldn't assign ourselves. The expectations are unclear, the damn shoes are more expensive than we want them to be, our muscles ache, our feet are too slow and fall behind the music. And then bit by bit, we learn the basic steps, and as we start to learn the dance, we really just have to bear in mind the main rule: keep going.