Editor's Note: A make-up artist willing to donate a couple of hours is urgently needed for the Oct. 10 event (some compensation, sponsorship may be available.) Please contact Andrea Peterson at [email protected]
There is a certain disco song and the voice of a certain professional dance instructor constantly reverberating in my mind these days … and nights.
At times, they keep me awake deep into the night — and might even have caused me to break out in hives — as I work through the choreography in my head to the endless boogie beat and persistent count of my instructor (and… one, two, three.)
Suddenly, after two months of weekly lessons with Kelly Stacey at Artistica Ballroom Dance Studio and almost daily practising in my kitchen, hallway and garage, my Boogie Wonderland, or maybe my Disco Inferno, is upon me.
I am taking part in the Newmarket-Aurora Dancing with the Easter Seals Stars this Thursday, Oct. 10 at the Royal Venetian Mansion in Aurora to raise awareness and money for kids with physical disabilities.
One of my fellow celebrity dancers, lover of disco (“when I’m not choreographed”) and York Regional Police Deputy Chief Paulo Da Silva tells me he, too, has a case of Disco Fever.
He has been practising hard, particularly his signature move of the evening; "the vertical body wave.”
“I probably learned that I’m stiffer than any board you can imagine,” Da Silva adds with a grin. ”In my case, it’s a tree wave, because it doesn’t bend… but it’s coming along.”
For this Disco Diva, this year’s disco theme — and the promised support of friends and family to help me meet ambitious goals for ticket sales and fundraising (*love you all!*) — may have lured me to accept the challenge initially, but hearing from the kids and their families about the impact of Easter Seals in their lives has made this cause deeply resonate with me.
When I spoke with Choe Fraser, one of the Easter Seals Ambassadors, she told me she liked cheerleading, dance and horseback riding. I felt a little ashamed when I realized I wasn’t expecting to hear that — despite the fact it’s exactly what you might expect a 13-year-old girl to tell you.
Because of a C2 spinal cord injury, Chloe uses a power wheelchair, as well as a manual chair, hand splints and a walker at times. She tells me she can walk “but with a lot of assistance,” and needs help getting dressed and transferred from place to place.
She speaks with quiet confidence and maturity, and shares that she wants to be a teacher and a camp counsellor, too.
Attending Easter Seals’ accessible and inclusive camps — at least seven times so far — has helped Chloe discover her true potential without limitations.
“I like everything about camp,” Chloe says with enthusiasm, mentioning the giant swing, rock wall climbing, sailing and kayaking. “I learned something new each time.”
“Camp is so amazing, it’s so different compared to anywhere else, everything is accessible,” she adds. “It has made me aware of how other places are not.”
She wants to create more awareness about accessibility and how buildings should be built to remove barriers.
Chloe has blossomed at camp with its underlying assumption that she is capable and can be independent.
“Camp made me more independent, at school they always help you, without asking if you need it or not. At camp, they give you a chance to be independent; at camp, they will ask before they help.”
While Chloe says she is shy, she overcame that to share an impactful message as an Easter Seals Ambassador.
“I want (other disabled kids) to know my story and know they are not alone. I want (them) to know they can do anything as long as they want to do it.
“When people hear about my experiences, it can change their understanding of what being physically disabled is.
“We really can do everything when we want to.”
I believe that, after talking to this amazing girl who has become my inspiration to ensure this year’s Dancing with the Easter Stars is a rousing success and is able to meet its goal of raising $140,000. It costs about $2,400 for eight days for kids like Chloe to attend camp.
“This event empowers kids, it gives them independence, it gives them dignity, it gives them freedom, everything we all take for granted,” said Central Ontario Easter Seals development manager Charlene Myke.
The Dancing with the Easter Seals Stars is the main fundraising event to support the kids and their families in Newmarket and Aurora, she says.
“People just need to know how this is appreciated by Easter Seals kids and their families,” Myke adds.
An essential part of the annual event is the commitment of the professional dancers and instructors at Artistica Ballroom Dance Studio in Aurora — my Disco Queen partner Kelly Stacey, Patrick Derry, Anastasia Trutneva and Sarah McMillan — who each pair up with two of the eight celebrity dancers. It’s the ninth year in a row that the Artistica team has volunteered for the event.
“When we first got approached to do it, I was familiar with the charity Easter Seals, I knew what they did and what they stood for, and that was it, full stop — anything that we could be involved in to help raise money for kids that need equipment, assistance, whatever, that was a pretty easy yes for all of us,” says Stacey.
They jumped into the endeavour with few guidelines and were given free rein, Stacey says, and in the following years, fine-tuned and developed “a method and a formula” for training the celebrity dancers and putting on an entertaining show within a short timeline.
She readily acknowledges the challenge ... that keeps me sleepless some nights.
“You have to not only digest all this new information at a light speed, but you are learning to do a choreography and then to take it to the place where you have to perform it.
“We’re very conscious of making sure that the student, or in your case, the celebrity, feels fantastic. That’s our goal, we want to be right there with you, holding your hands, having fun and enjoying it with you. … Every year, it just gets better and better.”
What they didn’t expect was the friendships and bonds created by this community of people sharing a common purpose to make a big impact in the lives of kids with physical disabilities.
“I wasn’t expecting to build these long-lasting relationships with the people that we’ve been working with. There’s still people that we see in the community who speak so highly of us because of their experience with us,” Stacey says. “We were just ourselves and tried to put together a good show. What we’ve been able to put together is kind of astonishing.”
Derry agrees, adding, “The things that stand out the most are what's said after the event, whether it’s the community who attended or the participants. For us, this is what we do all day, this is our life, we get in front of people and dance all the time. For us, it’s not a novel experience, it’s normal.
“To have people right from year one talk about how this was life-changing, a once-in-a-lifetime experience, it almost caught us off guard at first, almost like ‘really, you’re just dancing.’ But for us, that was huge because it’s really what we’ve modelled the business after, the things that this can do for people, which when you do it all the time, you kind of take it for granted.”
For us “stars” feeling a little jittery as show time approaches, Stacey has some words of wisdom: “Remember what you’re doing it for. At the end of the day, fun has to be the priority. It will be the best memory for yourself if you can look back at it with joy.”
Da Silva has already taken that sentiment to heart.
“Kelly has spent a lot of time with me. I just want to make sure I do it for her, and more importantly, I do it for all the kids, right? That’s why I’m here.”
His message to his supporters is “go ahead, have a lot of fun on me, and know it is going to be the best show in town.”
I'm sure watching him perform his tree vertical body wave will part of the "joy" awaiting us.
Tickets, $160, are limited now — the event sells out every year — but you can continue to make donations, which directly support kids like Choe with a life-changing camp experience, and essential equipment and services. Your donations are a vote for a dancer, and would greatly be appreciated by: Debora Kelly, Paulo De Silva, Joanne Russo, Joe Cappiello, Marco Di Girolamo, Myles Doak, Mae Khamissa and Shani Whittle.
