When I was a freshman in college, I went to Ft. Lauderdale over spring break with my roommate and a few other friends. One day, on a very crowded beach, a sour-looking older woman sitting near us asked us what school we were from. We told her, and she rolled her eyes. She was a teacher at another college, whose dates for spring break differed from ours, but overlapped by a few days.

“I came here on vacation,” she told us, “to get away from students.”

None of us said anything, but we were all thinking the same thing: If she wanted to get away from college students, what in the world was she doing in Ft. Lauderdale?

Before I tell you what made me think of that now, some fifty years later, I have to tell you about Cinderella, the ballet a friend and I attended last Sunday.

As we walked from the parking garage to the theatre, we saw a mom and her young daughter, who was dressed like a Disney princess. Before long, we saw another little girl in a princess dress. Then another, and another.

By the time we got to our seats in the theatre, we had seen more princesses than we could count. Most of the audience consisted of young families, and there was a loud buzz of conversation before the performance began. I wondered if it would continue once the ballet started, and found myself getting a bit annoyed at the prospect. That’s when it hit me: I was turning into that sour old lady at the beach.

I forced myself to ignore the chatter—which was mostly drowned out by the orchestra anyway—and focus on the ballet, which was beautiful and stunning in every way: the sets, the costumes, the music, and especially the dancers.

I found out later that Cinderella was one of Atlanta Ballet’s Family Ballets: child-friendly fairy tales told through dance, set to classical music, and recommended for ages 2 to 12.

If I had known all this ahead of time, I would still have decided to attend the performance. And I would have been more understanding, right from the start, about the presence of so many children. Rather than worrying whether they would spoil my enjoyment of the ballet, I would have immediately appreciated seeing all those young princesses—and princes—attending a ballet and learning from a very young age to enjoy and appreciate the arts.

It occurred to me then that an attitude like this makes me much less likely to turn into a sour old lady. And more likely to live happily ever after.

March 25, 2024
©Betty Liedtke, 2024

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