Topic: Officially sent in my letter to quit my dance troupe.
Moondark's photo
Mon 09/07/09 07:51 AM
I sent my troupe leader an email that I was going to quit the troupe and lessons.

What follows it the email on my reasoning. I felt it was fair that she knew why in case these were things she wanted to work on for the future of her troupe.

Does this sound calm and clear and not an attack?

Tribal Dreams:  I was pissed I didn't have time to eat.  But mostly, I was seriously pissed at you.  That was the day I pretty much lost faith in how you run things.  The time you said you wanted to leave became the time to meet instead.  Therefore we were missing the beginning of everything we were most interested in. 

Then there was letting me do things wrong for half a year and then expecting me to be able to correct the muscle memory, and not screw up, in the next 10 minutes.

There are other issues that we have already discussed, so I won't rehash those.

But one that I just but my tongue on was when you were trying to figure out coming out of the circle you were adding to a dance and the clear answer was that the lead person let go of the end person and the circle unwinds into a string.  Which I mentioned right off the bat but was completely ignored because I don't have 10 years dance experience so I would never know what I was talking about.  And then you proceeded to spend the next 15 minutes of class figuring it out and coming up with exactly what I had originally said. 

That was the night I realized that no matter how long I spend taking classes, no matter how matter what I did to practice, I would always be treated like the idiot child in the troupe because I would forever be 8 years behind you.  I think that was probably the day when part of me just pretty much gave up. 

Other things: Given the amount of money I plug into the laundry machines here, and the amount of time I have to spend doing laundry because of the small machines and the dryers that do not work very well, and the fact that I have to constantly check to see if I can even get the machines that evening, and then the fact that most of the time I have to end up doing laundry until 1:00 or 2:00 am anyway, I found it extremely insulting when you told someone that the reason I had so many loads the one weekend was because I never do laundry.

The reason I had so many loads was that I had an opportunity to do laundry where I didn't have to pay for it and had bigger machines so I took ALL my bedding with me to get all the winter bedding freshly laundered before I put it into storage for the summer.  Three large, heavy comforters made three loads by themselves, not to mention all the blankets and sheet sets.  Same with winter sweaters and coats I was putting into storage. 

Needless to say,  I was pretty pissed. 

Also, after the last Anime Hoshii meeting I was at, and the particular way you had mentioned the Kabuki mask painting class being scheduled for one of the upcoming con's, I felt that you basically got me to create the class and now you are keeping it for your own.  So I rather feel cheated and taken advantage of by that.

After that day, I spent a lot of time thinking about things. I had nearly decided that since I had lost all faith in your leadership, that perhaps I should just quit dancing with you. But decided that perhaps some it it was whatever was going on at work, before you quit. After all, something had to have been going on because it seemed like you really were having trouble getting into the mindset for the Bazaar. As a result, none of the rest of us were either.

But then I decided to go to the Drum and Dance circle when I really wasn't feeling up to it. But I said I was going to go. I also knew exactly what skirt I was wearing.  In fact, that part of the email really didn't piss me off.  It was your comment about the full length mirror that pissed me off, and pretty much was the last straw. Actually, all you had to do was say, “I see you aren't planning to dance tonight.” Seeing as I really didn't want to. But I sorta felt obligated.

You see, you want people to take your rules seriously, but it gets to be rather more difficult to do after 2.5 years of you not taking your professionalism as a paid dance instructor seriously.  Who cares if anyone is on time or not, because you never are. It was really aggrivating when you would send out an email admonishing people to be on time that night and then still be late yourself. People in the second hour sessions were getting pissed that they were on time but the first hour sessions were always running over to make up for the time.  But then they were only making up part of the time.  So they were getting shorted. 

While I think you are an amazing dancer, I don't think you are a good leader. Since losing faith in you in that aspect, it has become more and more of a burden to practice and more and more often I actually find myself dreading class rather than being excited and eager to go to class, as I used to be.

Ultimately, I think it is time for me to quit. 

Moondark's photo
Mon 09/07/09 08:03 AM
Sorry it was so long. It didn't look that long in my email browser window.



oldsage's photo
Mon 09/07/09 08:19 AM
Well stated, shows your reasons, gotta do, what you gotta do.

Hope it all works out.

motowndowntown's photo
Mon 09/07/09 05:24 PM
It sounds very much like an attack. You also need to proof read better. It is very long and runs on with complaint after complaint. If you are going to quit a position in any arts type organization you are better off just writing short and sweet that you have decided to pursue opportunities elsewhere and leave it at that. You don't want to burn any bridges. And any of your "suggestions" for improving the troupe probably will not be taken to heart anyway. Hope this helps you out a little for next time.

WolfEyez's photo
Mon 09/07/09 05:29 PM
sorry, but I agree with motown. It does sound like an attack, I personally, could not even read the whole thing just because it was too long and some of the run on sentences I had to re-read. It lost my attention in the middle of the letter.

Nothing personal.

talldub's photo
Mon 09/07/09 05:31 PM

Sorry it was so long. It didn't look that long in my email browser window.




Sorry, I couldn't make it all the way through. Too many buts. Brain hurts now. Good luck with whatever it is!