How This All Started

As most of you know, I’ve been involved in dancing and acting since I was little, and have been involved in Christian creative arts since 2003. The past seven years have been the greatest and most challenging of my life, and since this is supposed to be a blog chronicling a year devoted to ministry, I’d love to share with you all a little bit about how God has worked in my life in this area, and how I believe it has blessed others and can continue to do so. I apologize for the length of this blog, but I do hope you’ll read it and continue to pray for me as I go through my final approval steps, raise my monthly support and devote more time to the arts ministry than ever before!

So here ya go – a Tam creative arts autobiography condensed to a few screens:

My mom stuck me in a 4-6 year old ballet and tap class when I wasn’t 4 yet, which I think spawned not only a love of dance, but also a continual feeling of “smallness”, inadequacy, inability to keep up, etc. etc. I still look back on that first dance class as being in a room full of giants (aka the 6 year olds), and I can still picture arms and pink leotards towering over me. And then there was the one time I wet my pants during across the floor time, and then my hair ribbon fell in the pee puddle as some sort of horrific grand finale (see mom, this is probably why they had the minimum age requirement…..)

I danced there until I was about 9 (not in the same class, I wasn’t COMPLETELY inept), and then I discovered horses and ice skating, and left dancing in the dust. When I was 11, I decided I was going to be a famous actress (AND figure skater, mind you), and thanked my family for the last eleven and a half years, it was great, but I was moving to Hollywood. I think they panicked a little, because I was sneaky, resourceful, and actually did have a bachelor uncle who lived in the Hollywood area, so I was pretty convinced he could use an adorable child around to help him out with this or that.

Needless to say, my parents didn’t jump at the idea, and so there was a compromise – audition rounds in nearby San Francisco, and involvement in the local children’s theatre. In San Francisco, I went to a modeling and “career” center, where they drained our family’s finances and told me I was too scraggly, too awkward, too ugly, and not talented. An agent promised to call and never did, and a casting agency tore me apart and left me in pieces on Market Street.

My father was a smart cookie – the other half of the deal – Santa Clara Junior Theatre, was a much better option. We acted, sang, danced, and built/painted our own sets. I paper mache’d myself to a faux house for one play, was cast as a singing and dancing moth queen in another, and basically continued my trail of thespian disaster until the end of high school.

One of the worst plays ever. But it was so fun and taught me a lot.

College brought me back to my love of dancing – first at De Anza, where our classes danced at Flint Center, and then at UC Davis, where I was chosen for the Grenada Artist in Residence program that only accepted a dozen or so of those who auditioned. I was thrilled, and then all he** broke loose….the artist in residence for this season was Nigel Charnock, a deliciously brilliant Englishman who loved to create dance pieces featuring limber, sweating college bodies writhing together on stage in the name of art. The costume requirement for all the girls – anything from Victoria’s Secret, and a little splash of nudity here and there should we choose. After hours of rehearsals (and tears), I finally gave up my part in the performance, knowing it was far from in sync with my Christian morals and beliefs. I was blessed to maintain a good relationship with Nigel and the cast despite quitting only a month before opening, but was devastated in knowing that dance was pretty much no longer an option for me if I was going to follow Jesus.

That was when Rose came to UC Davis and started CityGate Dance, where she invited a few girls to dance with her in the first production. I was awful. I was beyond awful. I was far below the technique level necessary, and she lovingly fired me. That spring she let some of the university students choreograph, and I created a human video with some friends. It turned out pretty sweet, and when Rose got a job in another city, she (in a moment of weakness/insanity?) asked me to take over as CityGate’s director. I went from the worst dancer to the one in charge during one school year, and my self esteem was shot.

I prayed and prayed, and God brought lots of dancers that next year. We produced two full length shows, and to this day, they are still my absolute favorite thing I’ve ever done.

The funny and serious sides of CityGate

The next summer, I went to YWAM Montana for their 2 month summer of dance program, and our outreach phase was to Taiwan. During my time away from home I was (again) one of the weakest dancers on the team, but it was pretty obvious God did not have me there just to dance – I learned self worth, confidence, and VALUE in the Lord while I was with YWAM. I wish every day that I had seized more opportunities during this amazing summer, and if I could go back in time, I would have done anything with YWAM that God would have for me. It was incredible. If you were a YWAM leader/participant that summer…..I love you. Thank you for changing my life.

Dancing in Taiwan

So then I went home, got married, went back and guest choreographed one last CityGate show, and then Frank and I started “church shopping.” Through the amazing Todd Johnson, we visited a church in Roseville, and then through some weird turn of events I don’t really even remember, I somehow got permission to start a performing arts ministry. We called it Turning Point Dance. We were new to the church, the first rehearsals were a total disaster, and I cried every single Sunday.

But then, again through prayer and others praying for us, things came together and we had our first couple of shows during Sunday morning service. In 2007 we did our first full-length production – Alice in Wonderland….Reimagined. Then last year we did Blue Sky Savior, and then this year we are doing Project 365!

We’re about to leave for our second dance missions trip to the island of Trinidad & Tobago, and we’ve toured to different places around here. We were just asked to audition for Rock the Block California, and we’re rapidly moving forward toward more expansion.

In other words, we are blessed. And we (and any other ministry) cannot survive or thrive without the support and prayer of loved ones. So thank you for giving me a fun 7 years. I am so excited about the future.

P.S…..My final MAPS decision will be made by the AG on Tuesday…..wheeeeeee! <3

P.P.S – I am still not the greatest dancer. I’ve gotten better, but I’ve learned that isn’t what ministry is about. Dancing from the heart is so much better….thank you Jesus for that.