The Inside Press

Magazines serving the communities of Northern Westchester

Beth Besen

Let’s Go Clubbing… Club Fit Experts Weigh in on Undertaking Personal Fitness Journeys

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At Club Fit: Donna Berta, fitness director, and Steve Butler, personal trainer
PHOTO BY MIA BROWN

Remember the 1980’s? If you too are of a certain vintage, there are simply some things you’ll never forget. Fashion? Fluorescent! And we loved our big hair, our even bigger shoulder pads. Of course, like Melanie Griffith in Working Girl, that was just for work. When we wanted to work out, we rocked leotards and leg warmers and tried to channel Cher’s “If it came in a bottle, everyone would have a great body” and Jane Fonda’s “No pain, no gain” mantras.

Ahh, nostalgia. Though we may look fondly back at the “music still on MTV” eighties, and while it’s true that what goes around comes around (so we’re seeing some of those eighties looks back in style!), it’s also true that we’ve moved on in many ways. This includes our approach to fitness.

Club Fit fitness director Donna Berta couldn’t agree more, citing “people are more active in general, especially older people, and ‘old’ is not the same as it used to be.” That said, Berta points out that her own family was always an exception, as all of them were always active and sporty, including her mom who played basketball with Berta and her siblings. She views her mother’s active way of life as inspirational, and notes that current attitudes about fitness have caught up with what her mom seemed to instinctively know. Today’s healthy mantra is less about getting skinny and more about having skin in a daily fitness regime.

Donna, who has been with Club Fit for 28 years now, notes the clients who come with specific health improvement goals and others who come to maintain their fitness via the many options the club offers, but, overall, everyone recognizes the need to be functionally fit for all that life has to offer. One great example Donna mentioned is a club fit member and personal training client who is in his 80’s and came to Club Fit to work on staying fit to be able to play with his grandchildren and granddogs…have to say, this puts a whole other spin on the “eighties”!

Changing it Up

PHOTO BY MIA BROWN

What’s in the fitness lineup these days? Unless you’ve been living on some alien planet far, far away (ok, COVID isolation felt a bit that way, but still), you know that there’s so much more to exercise than, say, running on a treadmill. Of course, treadmills are still a great way to get your cardio on, but changing up workout routines is why gyms like Club Fit have become a key part of so many people’s lives and routines. Yoga? You bet. Pilates? Yes, please. These days, and at any age, we can Spin, Dance, TRX, HOIST, Box, Kickbox, and swim our way into health and well-being. It’s like a well-laid buffet, only all-you-can-exercise instead of eat! And if classes aren’t your thing, there are plenty of the latest cardio machines to keep your heartrate pumping, and weight training circuits and free weights for strength training too.

Not sure how to get started? Need some help changing up your routine? Want an expert to make sure you’re doing things the right way? That’s where personal training comes into play. Personal trainers are often motivated to help others achieve health benefits because they’ve personally “been there, done that”.

Take Club Fit’s Steve Butler. He’d always been into sports and had been managing a retail sports shop, but quit his gym membership during Covid which led to a decrease in his regular fitness routine. He also shared that he moved in with his girlfriend, which led him to put on some “happy weight”. He soon realized he needed regular fitness back in his life.

A Journey to Call Your Own

PHOTO BY MIA BROWN

To achieve his goal, Steve built his own home gym and got down to some serious self-training. It paid off so well that others started to ask him for tips. He took this as a “sign from above” and became certified as a personal trainer. He loves the work, and working one-on-one, saying “I love to help people. I tell them about my journey but always tell them they’re an individual so their journey will be their own–whether it’s weight loss or fitness or both. I mix it up for everyone depending on their goals, and whether they’re beginners or experienced.”

I asked Steve about working out as we age, and he, like Donna, spoke to the importance of maintaining fitness over time, noting strength and balance are key and that optimal nutrition is vital too.

Yes, healthy bodies and minds do need to stay fueled. Sometimes we all need a bit of help sticking to a healthy diet too. Whether you’re looking for a quick energy boost or a full-on meal, whether you’re counting calories, doing Keto, or just looking for healthy options you don’t have to cook yourself, Club Fit has delicious meals and snacks including, per Inside Press’s own Grace Bennett, some of the very best soups and smoothies around town!

Speaking of Grace, many know of her incredible father “Poppy”, and that he passed away only somewhat recently, enjoying a full and happy (yes, happy, even having lived through and surviving the Holocaust) 97 years of life. Grace shares that Poppy was always on the move, telling her frequently that “blood flow” is the key to health.

In his honor, and because age and isolation do slow even the most intrepid editors down, Grace started working out again herself. And, yes, she’s (back at) Club Fit!

Grace shares that she has been a Club Fit member on and off for the last 25 years of so.

I can well relate! Sure, I loved my 1980s health club; there were great classes, fun and inspirational instructors and lots of locations so I could work out near my office or my apartment. Funny thing is, I don’t recall ever seeing anyone much older than I was. Nor did I see any families with kids. I worked out with friends, flirted a bit, even had a few gym dates!

When my husband and I moved to Chappaqua nearly 30 years ago, with a toddler in tow and a baby on the way, well, let’s just say I was looking for a different type of gym experience. Club Fit felt like a warm and welcome way to meet our needs. And now? With those kiddos long grown and flown, gotta say, it’s still (like Stacy’s mom) got it going on!

Steve Butler with Grace
PHOTO BY MIA BROWN

Nesting from Chapp to Tapp

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At Stephen’s 50th birthday, all four of us in Chappaqua

When my kids were little, one of our favorite bedtime books was The Best Nest by P.D. Eastman. I can still recite much of it from memory, maybe they can too; I know my oldest could “read” it well before he could read. But I digress. Point is, that beloved story is foremost on my mind these days as Mr. Bird and I prepare to leave our empty nest and settle into a smaller coop. Or, in our case, condo.

It’s a daunting task, moving. And, perversely, it gets daunting-er the older you get. Dorm-moves? Mostly trash bags and buy the boys some beer. First apartment? Ikea flat packs and the boys still like their beer. New home? Ok, this time we call the professionals–but it’s one small truck and all kinds of excitement. And space, lots and lots of space. Space to grow a family, to buy adult furniture, to fill closets and fulfill dreams. Decades worth. So, at the end of nearly 27 years, the tangibles and intangibles are simply too numerous to name. You pack your real and virtual boxes and pack a huge emotional punch along the way.

Enjoying our New ‘Hood

That said, and unlike the Birds, this is really it. No deciding to stay after all. The house sold quickly and the new owners are…well, lol, they’re us, 30 years later. That old saying “the more things change, the more they stay the same”? Too true! They are perfect for our young neighborhood, and we wish them nothing but happiness in our/their home.

Today, they are coming by to re-see the house, to take measurements, to have me “walk them through” how everything works. I have prepared lists for them–HVAC to lawn maintenance to snow removal, all the nuts and bolts. For them, I suppose that, not the move, is the daunting thing. But I’d like to think they’re also coming to imagine themselves into their future lives here…

Which kid gets which kid-room? Will they have bath time rituals, and will those rituals include fish stories (fish tiles inspire fish stories, or so we always thought). Will they put in a swing set (do we still call them that!?) and will it go where ours was? Can they see the bus stop across the street? Every morning it’s packed with kids and cars, parents and pets. I still have my first-day photos for K-5; maybe they will do the same.

Will they love the smell of lilacs wafting into the kitchen, the lilacs I specifically planted there because they remind me of MY childhood summers. Do they have a dog, will they get a dog, should I mention the garbage truck guys carry dog biscuits for all the furbabies out walking in the ‘hood.

And for us? Well, the whole thing started even before this seller’s market. We knew we’d outgrown our neighborhood and, to be honest, also our home. While we built it, and still love it, we no longer need all this space and the upkeep it requires. So, we took a deep breath, extended our wings and jumped. We hope we’ve chosen a soft landing. We’ll be just down the road–nearby enough to see friends and frequent favorite places, but new enough to re-invent ourselves to some extent, to test our senior wings in a new lifestyle. The plan is to rent for a couple of years while winding down to final retirement and deciding whether to fully stick around or finally cut the NY area cord. Ultimately, we hope to tweet with Bird-like contentment that we’re well and truly best-nested.

The Westchester Bank: Banking Made Personal … & Staying Personal During COVID-19

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John Tolomer, CEO, The Westchester Bank

What does ‘Banking Made Personal’ mean? For The Westchester Bank’s (TWB) President and CEO John Tolomer, it’s more than a catchy tagline; it’s the essence of his bank’s 12-year history of community-focused, hands-on business. Moreover, and in Tolomer’s estimation, “the pandemic has certainly taken TWB’s Banking Made Personal to another level.”

Tolomer, a proud Chappaqua family-man and resident for 30 years, has seen many changes to our town over time. But what hasn’t changed is the shared community need we all feel to connect with one another. It’s what drives so many to choose a small Westchester town in the first place, and what then drives many locals, and local and not-for-profit businesses, to turn to The Westchester Bank for their needs. Says Tolomer, “we live up to Banking Made Personal everyday with every customer.”

Tolomer highlights the importance and security of feeling connected, noting that with TWB, customers enjoy ongoing and often long-term relationships. They equally appreciate avoiding the frustrations associated with bigger banks… impersonal 800 numbers and inevitable long outgoing message and automated menu; instead they can call their TWB branch and speak directly with a manager.

Recognizing that a phone call provides an invaluable way to connect, calls were among TWB’s first response to reassuring customers that all was secure when COVID-19 first became known. Tolomer notes, “we had the opportunity to call each and every one of our customers to see how we could be in a position to help them ride through the economic uncertainty.” He further shares that he and his team have always routinely run contingency plans, including the prescient “what if” of a pandemic.

With their last planning session completed in January 2020, TWB was fortunately well-prepared to put their latest contingency plan into effect as soon as the unprecedented news of global pandemic topped headlines in late February/early March. The upshot for all is not only reassurance, but gratitude. And gratitude that seems to cut both ways. “Being able to be a community bank and call your customers is very powerful,” says Tolomer, who then goes on to underscore that the feedback from customers has been very gratifying as well.

“Customers are grateful that we’re calling to personally ask how we can assist them, as opposed to badger them for payments and the like, and we’re grateful to have the ability to continue to serve and enrich our community.”

While both borrowing and depository customers really embraced the personal touch a phone call provided, true relief came from knowing that TWB had secured their bottom line. With help from the government’s Payroll Protection Plan of April 6th, Tolomer estimates TWB was able to facilitate in excess of $85 million in PPP loans, a sum that translated to saving over seven thousand jobs. Further, he and TWB continue to support a wide range of local not-for-profits–as has always been a hallmark of their mission–with ongoing no-fee products, services and employee volunteerism. Tolomer cites one such example, Feeding Westchester, as even more important right now, “as affluent as this community is, there are those in need of food, who are food-insecure, especially in these unprecedented times.”

Happily, the bank is continuing to operate at full strength. But, naturally, there are changes in the day-to-day way things run at present. Many officers are working remotely, and many customers are banking remotely. Of course, online banking isn’t new, but Tolomer says it has increased significantly including an uptick in mobile app use and scanning deposits. For those who are newer to online and mobile banking, TWB provides plenty of tech support.

Certainly, and as noted, a large part of the charm of local banking was coming in to “mingle” and see familiar faces. Many look forward to a return to those days, even as safety and caution–the buzzwords of the moment–lead both employees and customers to recognize that distance banking is in everyone’s best interests right now. That said, when necessity does require an in-person visit to one of TWB’s seven full-service local branches, rest assured that the bank has taken full social distancing and sanitation measures and that bank personnel are fully masked-up–and the expectation is that customers will do like-wise.

Banking Made Personal® is a registered trademark of The Westchester Bank

A Team Approach to Weight Loss Management at Northern Westchester Hospital

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Members of the team at Northern Westchester Hospital’s Center for Weight Management, which is housed in the Center for Healthy Living. (L-R): Rachel Goldman, Angelique Nicholson, Carla Larca, Julissa Pena, Laura Spallina

The Inside Press recognizes that weight management is a multi-dimensional issue, one which encompasses a myriad of physical and mental health issues. The following article seeks to provide some key information, and is neither judgment by nor opinion of the writer, editor or publisher.

These days, “home for the holidays” isn’t exactly the exciting work-break or reunion most of us associated with the phrase in years past. No, sadly, many of us have been home for quite awhile now, carefully working from that same home (if we’re lucky enough to be able to do so), helping our school-age children to learn from that same home and even supporting grown-and-flown adult children and/or parents who’ve returned to the nest as well. Likely, even Hallmark would agree that coziness has its limits, and holidays might take more than the usual toll on some.

For example, weight gain. Most years, as we approach the holiday season, we are both invited to indulge and cautioned to simultaneously take care; mouth-watering special holiday recipes on one morning talk show, “how to handle the office party and make healthy food and drink choices” on another. Let’s face it, celebrating and enjoying ourselves while remaining on the alert for hidden calories and sneaky sugars isn’t easy. Now, it’s not only that time of year again, but it comes on the heels of a nearly nine-month lockdown during which some of us became more sedentary, ate and drank more, and, much to our dismay, have had to recognize we’ve put on few pandemic pounds.

Sound familiar? Many readers will likely shake their heads in agreement, but also shrug it off as something they can deal with. However, for seriously overweight and obese people, additional weight-gain is actually quite critical. According to a CDC COVID-19 alert: “Obesity May Increase Risk for Severe Illness”. When President Trump was diagnosed as positive for the coronavirus, he was considered at higher risk for complications due to his age (74) but also due to his weight (undisclosed, but notably overweight).

Understanding Obesity

But what exactly is obesity? How do we define it? And, more to the issue, once defined, what can we do to better understand and remediate how it affects our health? For answers to these and related questions, The Inside Press turned to three members of the team of experts at Northern Westchester Hospital’s Center for Weight Management at Chappaqua Crossing; specifically Ms. Rachel L. Goldman, FNP-BC, CDCES. (Family Nurse Practitioner- Board Certified, Certified Diabetes Care Education Specialist); Ms. Pat Talio, RD, CDCE; and Dr. Mitchell S. Roslin, MD, FACS, Director of Bariatric Surgery.

In broadest terms, the condition of being overweight or obese is defined as having too much body fat, and the most widely used determining measure for this is the Body Mass Index, commonly referred to as the BMI. A simple equation originally proposed by a Belgian mathematician in the nineteenth century, the BMI is the body mass or weight (kg) divided by the square of the body height (m) or kg/m2.

Category BMI range – kg/m2

Severe Thinness < 16
Moderate Thinness 16 – 17
Mild Thinness 17 – 18.5
Normal 18.5 – 25
Overweight 25 – 30
Obese Class I 30 – 35
Obese Class II 35 – 40
Obese Class III > 40

Of course, like most tools, the BMI is not perfect; it doesn’t distinguish between body fat and denser tissue like muscle and bone. An athlete may have a high BMI and be perfectly healthy. But, for most people and healthcare professionals, the BMI is the gold-standard for determining people at risk for health problems due to excess weight. All interviewed for this article concur with this and with the World Health Organization’s (WHO) recommended body weight based on BMI values for adults. It is used for both men and women, age 18 or older.

While the BMI is but a simple measurement tool, the Center for Weight Management is a full-on toolbox of state-of-the-art health help. According to Goldman, when a potential patient calls the Center, the first order of business is a comprehensive medical screening including “a really long conversation with the patient to discuss their weight struggle over time; our relationship with food is complicated with many possible factors at play including emotional issues, lack of time to cook, lack of time to exercise. We take blood, and screen for weight-related underlying conditions–hormonal or metabolic conditions that make weight loss hard and unsustainable–and look for side effects of medications taken for other things. I’ve seen people who’ve been struggling to lose weight for years without knowing they have an underlying thyroid condition.”

Goldman notes that patients have continued to work with the Center remotely during the pandemic lockdown, and that the Center’s online content has grown and greatly improved. She also shares that the team has seen new patients as well, “people who recognize they’re extra vulnerable and are searching for new ways to be successful. We’re here for them, and eventually we come up with a plan which may include any or all of the following: nutrition counseling, medical-nutrition therapy, FDA- approved medication, surgery.”

Nutrition Counseling is Key

Explains registered dietitian Pat Talio: the foods we use to fuel our body aren’t all created equal. Talio discovered this herself as a freshman away at college for the first time. Having come from a “family who always ate well, used fresh and healthy ingredients and got outside to play sports a lot”, Talio wasn’t prepared for the relatively nutrient-poor but abundant food choices at college, and soon found she was on her way to gaining the proverbial “freshman 15”. Fortunately, she also found her way to health services who recommended she meet with a dietitian. The dietitian not only opened up her eyes to healthy food choices, but also to a regular exercise program (she’d been unaware that her home-based backyard sports games were about more than fun and were actually a means toward an ongoing healthy lifestyle).

What’s more, this all led to an abiding interest in nutrition, and her ultimate choice of career; Talio has been a practicing Registered Dietitian since 1985, and is further certified as a diabetes specialist. She sees a variety of clients including cardiac and pulmonary rehab patients for whom she points out that “nutrition is an important part of recovery.”

When asked about the differences, if any, between her work pre- and post-COVID-19, Talio says, “I never thought I’d be working from home but the hospital has been very supportive with technology and thinking outside the box! There’s greater scheduling flexibility for their appointments–and all without traffic and waiting rooms.” Her patient roster has remained fairly steady, but she does allow that the virus has led to new inquiries and perhaps provided an extra push to people who have been on the fence about seeking help; “they’re re-evaluating their health and their choices”. And, she adds, “I’m so thankful I’m able to offer support.”

Bariatric Surgery Option

Patients whose Center personal plan includes surgery often see Dr. Roslin, considered one of the best bariatric surgeons in New York, and an innovator in the search for new and better treatments of obesity. Roslin is full of compassion for his patients and their struggle as he describes the importance of surgical intervention.

He begins with what he calls Point #1: obesity is a chronic relapsing condition. He then provides a useful visual to what that means by saying “it’s like a rubber band that always wants to bounce back.” “And,” he adds, “this makes treating obesity extremely challenging.” Explains Roslin, “There’s an assumption that obese people overeat. That’s wrong. It has to do with insulin resistance which encourages fat formation as well as other metabolic activity. It’s impossible to tease out which comes first and they can also be synchronous. It’s not lack of will power.

Surgery is the only reproducible mechanism we have; it breaks insulin resistance and blunts recidivism–and it’s underused. The number of people who are in their 30s and 40s with obese BMIs will likely not be able to lose weight without surgery.” Roslin shares that his patients rarely come in due to some seminal event–e.g., a death in the family–but because they’ve reached a point in their lives “when functional impairment overcomes the fear of surgery threshold.” And, further, he notes “a majority have gained a significant amount of weight during the pandemic, as much as 25-30 lbs in the last few months.” Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean that they’ll be able to shed the weight as quickly as they put it on.

To be sure, surgery is not a substitute for a healthy lifestyle, and even though Roslin sees it as the linchpin to starting that healthy lifestyle, he, like Goldman and Talio all agree that the only way to truly treat the complex issue of obesity is to help the patient learn to make a sustainable lifestyle change. Sums up Roslin, “the reason centers like ours are so important is because we teach you!”

For more information or to speak to a member of the Center for Weight Management team, call (914) 223-1780.

A Star is Born… in Chappaqua: Meet Skyla

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A still from Skyla Schreter’s film, Unbecoming

During these difficult times, it’s important to come together–even when coming together is/must be a virtual reality. As a community, we can support one another and share the beauty; finding solace in that beauty, we can still enjoy our world. Enter Chappaqua’s own Skyla Schreter, dancer and choreographer, most recently with the San Francisco Ballet Company.

Skyla, daughter of Sena Baron and Daniel Schreter and older sister to Brice, grew up in town and, like most Chappaqua children, attended the local schools–in her case, Westorchard Elementary School and Seven Bridges Middle School. But, there and then, the similarities ended. Skyla, who “knew early-on what I wanted” chose and pursued a self-determined dance path when she was but ten years old.

She recalls, “I started with jazz, and I loved it. My mom suggested ballet as she understood it to be a foundation for many kinds of dance, and could provide the tools I needed to enhance the local jazz classes I was taking at the time.” Skyla says she tried a few classes here and there, but nothing felt somehow “right”, until she found Diana White in Scarsdale. With Diana, things “felt serious, structured and classic. It was like a light bulb went off for me.” So, at ten years old, she auditioned for and was accepted into the School of American Ballet (SAB) in Manhattan.

By middle school, Skyla was going in three times weekly; her parents took turns driving her in to the city and back home until she and they were comfortable with her taking the train by herself. In eighth grade, she was invited into SAB’s advanced training classes. This was another watershed moment in her young life, as the additional training time meant that her academic/dance balance would need to be revisited.

In order to make both work, Skyla transferred to the Professional Children’s School on the Upper West Side. For two years, she “took the 6:35 a.m. train with all (my) friends’ dads on Wall Street.” She’d attend academic classes from 8 a.m.–10:30 a.m., then take dance classes for two to three hours, followed by afternoon academics and then a return to dance. She’d finally take an evening train home in the 9 p.m. hour, starting her homework immediately on the return commute. Then she’d get up and do it all again.

This grueling pace finally slowed and became more manageable when she moved into the city at age sixteen, sharing an apartment with fellow dancers. Still, she’d come back to Chappaqua on weekends to spend time with her family with whom she has always been very close.

At her parents’ urging, Skyla took the SATs and completed the Common App in order to have options after high school graduation. However, as her 2013 graduation approached, she was offered a contract with the Boston Ballet in their second company and immediately accepted.

Skyla danced one season with Boston and, “almost on a lark but based on their first-tier reputation” attended an open audition for the San Francisco Ballet which was held in New York City. To her complete surprise, she was not only offered a position, but a contract with their prestigious corps de ballet. She admits that she had never thought of leaving the east coast for the west, but made the leap (or grand jete if you will) and quickly settled in to her new life there.

Skyla danced with the San Francisco Ballet for six seasons. While she had planned to retire this year to focus on choreography– “one of the things that most intrigues and inspires me about choreography is that it is self-made whereas dance is trained. Choreography is something I feel privileged to be able to share”–and move back to New York where she said: “performing arts is still best and most diverse.” The pandemic stepped up her schedule.

Pandemic Pivot

Skyla allowed that her biggest challenge is the “lack of collaboration available, at least physically.” She loves and misses the “real-time energy and ideas that happen and flow in the studio, working together with the dancers.” But creativity won out; Skyla used the initial lock-down period as one of introspection for herself and work. She began experimenting with different ideas, “taking a lot of time to explore details and nuances in my own personal movement that I normally would not allow myself the time or attention for.” She also began creating new outlines for future dance works, choreography she is “ready to translate to real bodies when the time comes.”

All that said, another challenge is the lack of audience. Skyla believes dance to “be a powerful experience not only for those who dance and create it, but for those who witness and watch it.” She found herself questioning the “point” of her work if it was no longer accessible, and determined that she must find a way to adapt dance to the virtual world. She had doubts about the power of dance on camera vs live, but “dove into creating dance that would end up not just on camera, but created for camera.” She was pleased to discover that “dance on camera can be very interesting and powerful in ways that differ from its live self.” One such dance of which she is quite proud is titled Unbecoming* and explores the many inner voices we all have, whether contradicting or difficult to face, and working to respect and ultimately accept them as part of our whole identity as individuals. It is about how these inner voices shape who we become.” Skyla also felt that Unbecoming was inspired by increased pandemic “alone time”, and the idea that alone time could provoke “a certain level of curiosity in the multi-faceted self.” She adds, “especially with all of the racial and social injustice that is finally coming to light, I feel that artists have a responsibility to speak to and mirror the times that we live in.”

Skyla rehearsing her choreography with fellow dancers of San Francisco Ballet
PHOTO BY ©Reneff-Olson Productions

Identity, Community and ‘In:Between’

Speaking of new choreography, prior to the pandemic, Skyla had planned to bring new dance works to New York: “I knew I wanted to launch my choreography by bringing it to a New York audience, and when I heard that the new Chappaqua Performing Arts Center was interested, I thought it would be the perfect anchor and springboard…In:Between was born out of much of my work which explores and deals with the space in between what we know and what we’re told. Dance can tap into a place that words can’t approach. This choreography explores the grey area between our thoughts.”

The plans included six pieces; five of Skyla’s own and one from guest choreographer and principal dancer with the San Francisco Ballet, Wei Wang. Skyla emphasized the team-effort involved with the creation of In:Between which, in addition to featuring dancers from the SF Ballet Corps de Ballet, also included 13 new costumes created exclusively for the show by both San Francisco–and NY-based designers.

In addition to dance, Skyla had lately been turning her creative energies to other artistic media–specifically, both film and painting. Her short film, A Flower, which was an official selection of the San Francisco Dance Film Festival in 2019 and the Utah Dance Film Festival in 2020) shows the journey of a flower through dance, and had been planned as part of the In:Between performance lineup. She had also planned to display her painting at the Chappaqua Performing Arts Center. “Ballet can be thought of as inaccessible or elite, but it’s really just another form of artistic expression,” she said. “I enjoy emphasizing a multi-faceted approach to artistic expression as more inclusive overall.”

Finally, and because art doesn’t just inform and inspire but can gather people for a cause, Skyla has devoted time to the New York-based non-profit Dancers Responding to Aids (DRADance.org), which is a part of the larger Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids program. DRA was founded in 1991 by Denise Roberts Hurlin, former Paul Taylor Dance Company member and mother of Skyla’s school-friend and fellow dancer Catherine. Skyla recalls attending annual DRA benefits at SUNY Purchase and “feeling the power, even as a kid, of everyone on stage and in the audience coming together.” She notes that “AIDS is very relevant to the performing arts community” and feels it’s important to do her part to support her community.  When audience members and dancers can safely congregate again, Skyla hopes to move forward with In:Between and DRA, perhaps, even as originally planned, at ChappPac!

Encore, Encore

It was impossible to resist asking Skyla many questions, or sharing them further here:

Skyla, you’ve accomplished so much in your young life, kudos to you! People must wonder if you ever felt you were missing out…on a more typical or normal childhood?

Skyla: No, I do not. I feel privileged to have known from an early age what I wanted. My thinking was “I just love to dance!” I recognize what I gave up, but I’m ok with it. There really is no “normal.”

Have you stayed in touch with Chappaqua friends?

Skyla: I left right before high school, and high school is a time when most kids find their paths and deepen friendships, so I don’t really have those friends. But I do keep in touch with my elementary school friends; these were real childhood friendships and they have lasted.

Do you have any advice for today’s kids who, like you, discover a passion early in life?

Skyla: Don’t be afraid to take an unconventional path. It’s not scary, it’s exciting! And, with specific regards to ballet, I think kids should know that you don’t have to be a “tutu ballerina” but can also go in with gym shorts and no makeup. There is no one way to do ballet! Whatever it is you love, go for it!

Finally and before you go–though you’ve graciously shared how you’ve personally pivoted with the pandemic and found new outlets for your creativity, can you briefly discuss your thoughts on how things have changed for the dance community at large?

Skyla: Not being able to train, rehearse, and create together in person has been a huge challenge for the dance community, and not being able to perform for an audience has been such a heartbreaking loss for all of us during this time, on many levels. But dancers are creative, and determined to keep working on their craft in one form or another. I have been taking and teaching dance classes online, virtually. One good thing that has come out of the pandemic is that it has broadened and connected the dance community. What used to be clusters of dancers, kept more or less isolated in their own companies, schools or cities, has spread to become a worldwide community. For example, right now, I am teaching a long-distance “Choreography Workshop” from my apartment living room. Though teaching class over Zoom has its many challenges, I wouldn’t normally be able to connect with these students otherwise at this time! This virtual dance community has so many opportunities for new and fulfilling connections that it takes a bit of the sting away from the physical collaboration we have lost during this time.

I also think what many people miss most, other than working in-person with their friends and dancers, is having the space to move freely. I can’t say that dancing in my living room is anything like an open ballet studio or stage. It is limiting in many ways. I personally have been trying to find ways to dance outside when possible, which is why I chose to shoot my film in various places around San Francisco, all of which were uncrowded enough to be safe for Covid-19 restrictions. Dancers like to be free and expansive with their movements and I think for those who can, finding time to spend in nature in some way or another, is a common choice for helping ease that feeling of being stuck or stagnant.