A slowly crafted monologue conceding your defeat.

I am a lover, and not a fighter, but I will fight for what I love. I fought for me, I fought for you, I fought against the universe, I fought against my heart, I fought my own eye ducts when I was holding back tears- but then I started fighting a better fight...one for MY dream and my very first love, my love of art, movement, music and pointed toes. People say, "you must be so glad this year is over", I wouldn't have changed a thing that 2009 brought me.

I learned more from the fight than I ever would have from the love.

Saying you love someone is easy, actually loving them, is hard.
Saying you will fight for someone is easy, but actually fighting for them, is hard.
Saying you love yourself is easy, actually loving yourself, is hard.

Whatever 2010 brings me, I will keep fighting the good fight.

if love were easy, I wouldn't recognize it.

get dirty.

My bestie Spagatti is very far away and I haven't spoken to him for over 2 weeks. I think in the course of our lifelong friendship this is the longest we have gone. I get to see him next week, but it is not soon enough.

I decided to write him old school email format and I ended up venting on and on about change and how much I hate it, and how I seemingly get myself into situations far more often than I should that involve massive life changes.

Change is really scary. I guess this is why people tend to buy houses and live in them for years, or get apartments and stay in the same city for more than say, 5 months. In my adult life I have had 8 apartments in 4 different cities, not to mention all the hotel rooms in between.

I have made some tough choices but I can already feel my inner self's muscles getting bigger. What is stopping me from jumping in head first to both the west +east coasts dance scene? only me. I refuse to ever stand in my own way, and so even though the next few weeks will be stressful I am so excited to set up my new home (I can see the Hollywood sign from my window). I am excited to do my thing based out of a city that is a way shorter plane ride up to see my momma.

I guess my point is: whatever you want to do in life, it is yours to have. You can move, move back, or fly away anytime you want. It is usually tricky, scary and stressful and it is usually the very best thing you can do for yourself. Take the chance. Always. The universe will always help you find your way, but you can never expect it to do the hard work for you. Unfortunately for us, our dream lives don't come wrapped in fancy paper under the Xmas tree, we have to go out there and create them.

What are you creating?

ps.
My favorite boys from Brooklyn.
Ode to my breakup with NYC.


pps.
did you know I have a twitter? sometimes I say stuff, and it's a good way for me to chat with you. anyways, follow me- twitter.com/keltiecolleen

with or without you.

Somewhere out there, there is someone who cannot live without me.
Someone who will grab me at the airport and spin me around.
Someone who loves to laugh + obsess + cry at movies + snuggle.

I cannot wait to meet you.

...meanwhile, I keep dancing.

Thank you, for showing me I am nothing special.

I am pretty sure that the reason I exist is to fall in love daily with glitter, feathers and musicals. So happy that it seems pop culture is accepting my favorite thing more and more. NINE was brilliant. Go see it.

A friend of mine said to me, "Oh lord I am Guido" + I said, "oh. I am the wife." I love this song- I love her big f-you moment in this movie. Fearless!

Hi, I am free.

The best christmas was the worst christmas. Yesterday, I woke up, cried a little on the phone with my family and the got a chance to talk to most of my very best friends for hours on end. Then I slept for 22 hours. I really needed it.

I woke up this morning, feeling clear headed and rested for the first time in months.
I noticed that somewhere in the middle of the early evening I missed a message on my phone. This is the kind of message you wait around for after your heart is broken to smithereens. If the stages of grief are true, then I spent alot of my “denial” period wishing for this message. The weird thing that happened was that I felt... nothing.

Not a thing.

I didn’t feel happy he was lonely wherever he was and thinking about me. I didn’t feel sad that I missed him. I didn’t miss him. I could care less what he was doing or where he was. I didn’t have to pre-determine how long I would wait to reply so that it appeared that I was farther along in the “over it” part of healing. I literally, didn’t care. I cared more about my pancakes. (yum, pancakes) I felt like, really?




The bottom line that santa brought to me and something that I hope everyone realizes is that:

There are million good people on the planet who love you, adore you, care about you, these people are funny, weird like you, and no matter where you are, or what hotel room you are waking up in can make homes out of the miles between you. I am home in a single word spoken with a best friends voice. These people, they matter.

There is always gonna be that one person, the one who got away, the one who fucked you up, the one who broke your heart, the one you swore you would love forever. That person, who becomes not even a person at some point, but becomes this overwhelming being, this sense of loss that you carry with you. They are not worth it. Seriously, stop crying right now. Maybe you cannot see it right now, maybe all the other stuff that gets tossed in the pile of human relationships makes it very hard to see- but people who treat you badly, are bad.


One boys trash is another boys treasure.

Xmas eve from the Virgina Airport...

Every year around this day people ask me "What am I asking for?". I could make a list of things I would like in my collection of things, but travelling with an extra small suitcase this year and being homeless has placed huge limits of my collecting of "things". I love it because it reminds me that the things that I really should be lusting after are not things I can hold in my hands.

I have been thinking alot about the laws of attraction and the way the forces of the universe work. If you would have told me last Christmas that I would spend the better part of this year wishing for replacements + to find some sort of remnants of the woman I used to be, I would have never believed you.

If you would have told me that I would appear in every major dance magazine, get my own clothing line, have almost 10,000 people continue to follow me and allow me to inspire them on a weekly basis, that I would use my sleepless nights to write, what I think, is a delicious coming-of-age novel, I would have never believed you either.

This year, I was forced to have all these things I did not want surrounding me, and no matter who hard I tried to forget them or misplace them, I could not. They followed me wherever I went, 24 hours a day. I was chasing a memory, or maybe I was chasing a place without memories with so much effort that, of course, they were like magnets to my heart.

I was trying to hard to show anyone who would look or listen why, little old me, was deserving of the stars. I scared away many a folk in the process. I have heard the word "intimidating" way to much this year from the opposite sex. It became clear as day to me, that when it comes to our dreams, the best thing you can do for yourself is to chase them. When it comes to relationships...well, anyone you chase will usually run the opposite direction.

I am not sure why the world works this way. It is confusing, heartbreaking and at times, frustrating. But I assure you, that once you decide not to care anymore, every single person you pined over during all those sleepless nights will instantly be running along side you to catch up. I wish I had figured this out sooner. Seems funny, but if you put yourself first, everyone else will put you first.

This year is my first lonely Xmas in quite a few years. I'm lonely. I will admit it. There will be no magical Christmas morning for me, but just a day filled with my friends, a few phone calls and hopefully many cookies. I am swamped with memories and at the same time I am excited about the future. I think that being alone this season has made me fall madly in love with my job all over again. I found myself with a fresh intent to what I do. I wasn't just filling my days, I was dancing my days. Love that.

I feel like, if I had made a Xmas list that it would have been pointless. I got the greatest gift this year. The gift of strength, power and the ability to finally find myself, in all my million little broken pieces and where I belong in this little universe. It was not easy, and it certainly did not come wrapped in a box with a shiny bow. I have kicked, cried and complained my way through my keltie-reinvention. But it is the best gift I have ever received.

Being okay with yourself, your situations, your past, your present and hopeful for the future is priceless. Having an amazing family is priceless. Having friends like I have, honest and true and good and enlightening is priceless. I hope that everyone takes some serious time over the next few days and gives their priceless gifts some giant hugs.

“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”
-Albert Einstein



Merry Christmas to my little army. I love you and I consider you one of my greatest gifts. Eat some home cooking for me!

lost in translation.

She loves: fresh pressed loose leaf green tea + high ponytails + paris + beautiful images + really soft skin + rockette red lips+nails + canada + daisies + avocados + bookcases

She loves the words: fearless + amorous + love + revbev + tomorrow + ambition + grace + applause + strut + crazytown + rad

She enjoys: entertaining the masses behind actors + singers + musicians + brands

She dreams of: time travel + snuggles + fancy pens + publishing a book + inspiring + making a difference + love

I hope your hell is filled with magazines + on every page you see a big picture of me.

Last night Christina and I talked late into the night about our plans for 2010.

2009 was a pretty gross year for both of us, and I think we share the feelings that we would both enjoy crawling into a comfy snuggie of protection and never ever come out. But we are strong, fearless females. Plans needed to be made.

More than anything this year, I realized that, nothing belongs to you, unless it is yours. It is not about what you are following but what you are creating.

Tho bottom line is:

friends don't let friends date losers

+

the only person that can demand what they deserve is you.

Love more + demand more.
I am.

I had a conversation with Santa tonight at the bar. I know this sounds silly, but it is true. Santa is quite the conversationalist. He called me 'intimidating". I got angry, again, because I am confused as to why people keep saying that about me. It sort of hurts my feelings. I asked Santa to explain- he said that we live in a world the is not conditioned to handle the truth. That I am someone who speaks the truth, and asks pointed questions and is very cut and dry. Interesting isn't it? That it seems like people who tell only and accept only the truth are considered "scary" by the rest of the population. I am not scary, I am honest. If you do not like what I am saying then perhaps, you do not like the truth. I have accepted MY truth. Sometimes, I hate the truth, but at the end of the day, the things that keep me up at night have nothing to do with guilt and lies.

My friend tells me this:

"You are just a wonderfully bright light that draws all sorts of bugs and butterflies. The lesson is---you can't filter the good from the bad----they come together. That's how you learn to tell the difference!"

It seems like this past year has sent me more bugs than butterflies. But she is right. I have finally learned to see the difference between them.


more than once was more than enough to place the blame on my side
if you think I'm gonna let you in again
you are out of your mind.

It's raining in Baltimore baby, but everything else is the same.

I am not going to say what I want to say, because I don't even want it to exist.
But I looked up today and a year had passed.
The people around me were talking and reminsiing about this skinny girl and a banana suit dancing around the stage taking pictures. I hadn't seen the staff in Baltimore since last year. People began to ask me what happened and I just answered with, things change.

And they do don't they? Or at least some things do.

Same city.
Same hotel.
Same job.
Same Arena.
Same Show.
Same Staff.
Same dressers.
Same dirty wood stage.
Same dressing room.
Same catering room.
Same training room.
Same call board.
Same costumes.
Same paycheck.
Same friends.
Same Aquarium.
Same phone number.
Same hairspray.
Same shoes.

A different me, minus you.

It's not sad. It's just different. You just learn to pull out that paint brush and paint over those memories when they threaten to stop you in your tracks. It was fun playing make believe for all those years, but I am realist now. I realize that the only things that you can ever count on are the things that stay. Not everything, or everyone, will. You might wake up one day and everything will be the same and everything will be different and everything and nothing will make sense. You will be happy and sad. You will be hopeful and hopeless.

And that is just the way it is.

I need a raincoat.

give me all of that love stuff, yeah.

every have one of those days where one of your besties writes a hit song and you are so excited you skip down the hallway?

There are only a few times I have gotten that gut wrenching feeling which is a delicious mix of goosebumps and the future and spicy Cajun sauce in my veins..

-10 years old dancing in my crappy studio in a jazz group to "in the name of love"
-hearing "hiding under water" by Beth Hart for the first time
-Walking out of my very first Disney Audition, after getting cut, being high as hell on adrenaline.
-anytime I land in an airport and the object of my affection is on the ground in whatever city I just landed in
-Paris, in general, but mostly at night.
-hearing Ryan play Northern Downpour for me, solo on the guitar on his bed in Vegas the night after he wrote it. Where did that song go? It was too amazing.
-the first time I did 5 turns clean.
-VMAS on the street on Manhattan, for sure.

And now...this...



She makes me feel Infinite.

I know it's easy to say, but it's harder to feel...this way.

People often ask me what is the best piece of advice I can give up-and-coming dancers and this is it.

Be you. But be the very best version of yourself that you can be. There is no need to be a cookie cutter version of what you think everyone wants you to be. There is a place for you. Somewhere, some casting director or choreographer is looking for someone just like you. Just walk into what ever auditions you have and be prepared with your dance bag full of talent, tricks and confidence. You won't win them all, or book them all- but I promise you that you will be right for something, somewhere.

I have always used this advice in my own career and it has lead to some of the best jobs and most amazing experiences. I have a reputation for being a hard working, quirky dancer with strong technique and a fun attitude. I consider that rad because I am a hard working quirkfest of a person who likes to have fun. I have only ever been myself and it has worked out really well.

Then over dinner tonight we are talking about "real" life and someone said this-

"Well, just be yourself, don't over think everything so much, you want people to fall in love with you, not that person that you think they are looking for"

I love that. Isn't that the exact same advice I have been giving dancers for years? Yet, I cannot seem to give it to myself, on a day to day basis. Just another example of how I can completely separate the two lives I lead.

There are such stark differences between the person that I am and the person that I want to be. I don't see that as a flaw, but a strength in my own character. If we were all content with ourselves then there would be hunger for growth, and I think that we can never stop growing. That's what it is all about. In my perfect moments I am a picture of grace, peace, composure and compassion. I know my worth and I would never waiver on the price for my work, or my heart. In my weakest moments I lay awake at night restless with the fear of the unknown and jealous rage for all the injustices of the world, grasping.

I truly believe that there are people out there looking for someone to run fast, travel the world and buzz around life filled with zest and passion with. Instead of trying to be what I think everyone is looking for- I have decided that 2010 is meant to be a year of me buzzing around, running fast and looking at the world through passion filled eyes. Maybe one day I will look beside me and someone will be running along with me, and maybe not. Either way, I am done trying to be anything but quirky, fast paced, workaholic, lover, fighter, dreamer, happily ever after-er that I am.

I am really good at that, and it is all I know how to be.


ps. I think Travis Wall is such a dreamboat of a dancer. Look at his turnout and feet. I love the way he moves, so effortless.

Stage Right End Girl #3

My life's these yellow lines, concrete, and parliament butts
Exhaust fumes and rest stops who drive hard for their bucks
Load in, sound check, play show, load out, let's go, next city, oh great, off day
Hangovers, hangups, dialbacks, running make up, apologies and promises
I'm putting miles on my body, bout due for a tune up in this gas station, food ain't really helping but
I'm loving every minute, every road signs a reminder of exactly why we did it to begin with...

The giver.

We just finished watching the TV special “the making of a spectacular” on the bus. This appears on TV in all the cities that we visit on tour. I am feeling an immense amount of pride. The documentary follows us from rehearsals, through tech, dress rehearsals and finally opening the show. The film is narrated by my directors, producers and a few rockettes, including me!

It is a very strange feeling to look at what I do through these amazing eyes. When I take a step back, it seems so vast and amazing. I guess when you are living within it, on a day to day basis, it seems more normal. I see visions of us on stage, in rehearsals, and from a far, it is just such an amazing show and the talent of the women that I share the stage with, is so inspiring.

I have spent most of this season living very far away from the actual world I exist in. my mind has been spending most of the time in the “ when I get it all figured out” place, and not actually being present. I have spent time pulling at strings, following hopeless paths and trying my very best to prove to everyone else that I am enough. I have been the queen of- "but I am this, and that, and I’ve done, this, and that, and these are all great reasons for you to love me or respect me."

I have been giving, everyone but me, huge amounts love and attention. Hanging by a thread on coattails, words and promises. Waiting. Trying to be everything, to everyone and missing out on meals, sleep and sanity in the midst.

Pulling back, looking at my life from a birds eye view way up in the nosebleed section of some random sold out arena, I can honestly say that I see myself as about 10% as special as I appear from a distance. I like this fact because it keeps me hungry for more, to do more and become a better person. I hate this fact because I feel like I owe it to myself to be a little kinder to my insides.

I spent a really long time feeling important because of what everyone else around me was doing. Peepshow was special, not because I was there, but because this or that star was there. The VMAS were special not because I was there but because of who I was dancing beside. The Rockettes are special, not because I am one of them, but because of the image that I see of 24 beautiful women up on stage.

I am determined to start seeing that the missing piece -the secret of life, is realizing that it isn't about all the shiny sign, or the credit or the work, it is about me. It isn’t about the fact that I get to live my dream and do really cool things, it is that I am there, doing these amazing things. Instead of pondering how I can turn these things into words, pictures, or future endeavours I should just look around, see how amazing it is and know that this is enough.

Maybe this is what is missing in our world right now. All these people running around wanting more, thinking the grass is greener, and never being able to be content with all the blessings they have.

Looking around me today the sun is shining, I have a delicious chai tea latte in my hands + some dope James Morrison tunes in my headphones + a giant purple hat. I am riding the bus to our next stop, surrounded by my best friends, living the dream. My dream. And it is enough.

Change.

"Ultimately, I have found it meaningless to hold the yardstick of fact against the complexities of the human heart. Reality simply isn't large enough to hold us."

Professional Auditioner.

Last night I was having dinner with friends and was talking about how our lives as performers directly affect our “non-dance” lives. We spoke about the amount of discipline that is instilled within us from a very young age and the level of respect we are taught to give to those people who constantly put us down. We stand in ballet classes for hours a week and are taught to say “thank you” when we are given a correction.

Lesson for young Keltie: when someone tells you what is wrong with you, say thank you. Don’t talk back, don’t fight it, just fix it, or do your best to try.

The same thing happens even in my professional life, each day when I arrive at the arena to get ready for the show I have not one, but 3 dance captains with pages of “notes” for me. It is their job to sit in the audience and pick me apart. From fingers, to eyeballs, to legs to kicks each move I make on stage, every single time I get on stage is judged.

Lesson for Keltie: Remember that time you were on stage and you were having so much fun and you felt amazing? Well, Your hand was one inch to high and your head was 0.00004 seconds to early in the kickline. You are never 100% right.

I was talking about what it is like to audition. An audition really consists of me walking into a room, presenting myself (hopefully the best version I have), presenting a headshot, a resume of everything I have ever done- TV! Training! Special Skills! I can rollarskate and do kartwheels! and I have literally 25 seconds to win an entire table of directors, producers and choreographers over. I have learned how to walk into a room, lay out every single thing I have to offer someone within 25 seconds, and how to win them over with only that.

In the dance world, this is an amazing skill to have. So often dancers make the mistake of thinking that they have time to get these important people to “warm up” to them. As a choreographer I know who I am going to book the second they walk in the door. The advice that I always give dancers when I teach master classes is to just “leave it all out there on the floor”. Take the few moments you get to shine in an audition and spill yourself so that when you walk off, there is nothing left to give. Our industry is so competitive, you can never hold back.

Now, having worked most of my life to cultivate these skills, it makes sense that this seems to be the exact same way I walk into every other area of my life. I walk into a date (aka audition) and I lay all my cards out on the table. I am an open book. I can give you A GREAT 2 minute summary of me. I swear it amazes even me that I don’t enter into these things with a head shot and a resume. Can you imagine?

Special Skills: making pancakes, crafting awesome presents, being incredibly busy, talking about myself, kissing, stealing your over sized shirts.

I am working really hard on learning to separate my dance life skills and my normal life skills. Since, I really have only been doing dance life thus far, it is seemingly difficult. This is something I see so much of in the entertainment industry, no one really knows how to shut-off. We are all, just always on. We have been trained to be salespeople, selling ourselves and our talents at all times. This habit leads to very successful careers and being very confused thoughts about all the other stuff.

Someone asked me if I have ever been chased. This sentence belongs on Mars. (ROCKETTES IN SPACE- the space spectacular- right shushu?) I have bitten my nails, and pounded my way through and hustled my way through everything, ever. It is what I do. Who I am. But, I am learning about finding the things that work, and finding the patterns that do not. The 2 minute audition works great for dancing. But perhaps, if you are looking for someone to spend a lifetime with, it might be smarter to use that lifetime to show them all your special skills.

Maybe, to someone out there, being with me is a dream, and so while I am chasing, tooth and nail, my own dreams, they might be chasing me. Or if I turn around, and the only person chasing me is the crazy homeless dude on the subway who wants my sandwich, I am fine with that too. As long as he doesn't take my 'wich.

try to decide what to do now based on love not fear.

epic.

tittie pop. I need to stop.

On a day like today I have a hard time writing down what I feel. I think this is the reason for personal blogs and why, they are so un-understood and so loved by me. People ask me why I am such an open book, why I don't just hold it all in, save it for a chat. This is my answer: because sometimes when I cannot find my words, I use others, and I know, that somewhere, someone is using mine.

This week I signed a year lease to move to the city of Los Angeles. I have hated the idea of LA, what I have seen it do to people and the plastic of it for so long. I refused so many times to move out west when I was asked. I, being typical Keltie, can only do things when it is on my own skin, my own terms.

I have to start learning to stop. I decided the only way I can stay sane is to start new. A new city, a fresh hunger and a new outlook. I need somewhere that I can take Hobo on long beach walks. I really need to be closer to my mom. I woke up the morning of the VMAs in NYC a few months ago and realized that everyone had moved out West. (well, save a few) Yes, there is more work in LA, but it isn't work I am going after. I need to slow down, start "participating" in the dream life I have created. If I go to New York I won't stop, New York doesn't let me sleep. I need a break. I am moving 2 doors down from one of my favorite friends C. Perri. I can almost imagine the funny looks we will get from our neighbours as I scurry down the street to her place for a morning cup of tea. The greatest thing about her, is that she just gets it. She gets me. Sometimes we fall into our little worlds away from each other and then, when we see each other again, we fall back in love. She is now a blogger and I seriously think you should all be reading...

http://christinaperriblogs.tumblr.com

She wrote this: which is a strikingly accurate vision of my life also. enjoy.

"To freely bloom - that is my definition of success."

i haven’t bloomed—im still blooming.

i had no idea that when i turned fourteen i would become an adult. i had no idea that i’d be so good at acting twenty three to match my id, to match my peers, my idols, my brothers, and south street in Philadelphia at three am. i thought i had arrived. who needed proms and first dates and drinking beer in the woods? who needed butterflies and insecurity? who really needed high school everyday? “8 o clock in the morning I fall asleep” who needed an innocence to lose naturally? who really needed to learn lessons slowly? don’t all seventeen dancing queens soul search all over the world? don’t all nineteens swear it away? aren’t all twenty-one’s married around their picket fence? who really needed advice and to slow down? who really needed an italian smack in the head?

january seventeenth will say its been ten years.

i know, now, that i did. i needed it all.

but this smile tells you i didn’t. id believe me too.

“the farther behind i leave the past, the closer i am to forging my own character.”


i never stopped smiling. i traveled around like a feather. gently falling where i didn’t belong. gently landing in your arms. gently wanting to become you. gently regretting. and gently looking for strength to stand on.

then on this september fifteenth the record stopped skipping.

today i’m standing straight. and on both feet. i’m actually twenty three and i wake up late. i write songs about boys and fears. i obsess over vampires and lead singers. john paul george and ringo live in every nook and cranny again. i have trouble remembering to eat vegetables. i clean my room when it’s messy. i fall in love with movies and songs and palm trees at night. i pretend and i make believe. i don’t act like i know when i don’t know. i giggle and c.ry. i get nervous and overly excited. i’m sensitive and unsure. i have fun and laugh so hard my stomach hurts.

i didn’t go backwards. i just caught up and I’m just finally right sized and blooming

My xmas list:

First of all, I am super happy that it is finally December- finally the world has caught up with me in the Christmas Department. very good news.

I will be spending Christmas eve traveling on a bus, and the morning at a hotel in Orlando. I was hoping that all of you could help me make my day a little better. I recently decided to take a small break from New York City and go spend a few months on the beach. The thought of struggling through winter gives me hives-I want, and I need to take some time for myself, without the pressure of it all, to just live, "participate" like Charlie would say. I have never done this. Since Aug. of 2008 I have taken 6 days off. Six. Six. Only Six. That is not okay, and most likely the reason I am losing my mind.

Anyways, after living on the road and in random apartments for so long the thought of actually getting to have a home is overwhelmingly wonderful. This is where I need your help. I have been dreaming of having a delicious photo wall like these. I want one side of my entire room to just be frames of all sizes, shapes, colors, filled with beautiful photos, prints, postcards, sheet music, playbills, drawings anything. You guys know me better that any one else so for XMAS I would love for you to mail me anything you can make, find, create that you think would work. I have already recieved some amazing photography and drawings that will be up there for sure.

Here is the address of my company's PO box in queens, if you feel like it, and feel creative send something along, it will make my xmas better than anything!

Keltie Colleen/CO Alinta
40-15 30th ave. Box 114
Astoria, NY
11103

In addition:

-I am super thrilled that Dance-Teacher Magazine for featuring my DVD inside it's gift guide this month! Super cute little write up!


-My cute little hometown newspaper interviewed me- I talked about you.
http://sherwoodparknews.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?archive=true&e=2195040