Last night, I went to my daughter’s performance of The Little Mermaid at her school. And let me tell you, these eighth grade girls absolutely crushed it. I cried so many times. I cried when they opened the show, when they closed the show, when the Little Mermaid Ariel came out, when my daughter, who played Ursula, came out. I cried at the mermaid sisters.
It was so emotional. There is something about, yes, your child coming of age and out there doing her thing, but there is also something about these girls on the cusp of womanhood – these 13-year-old girls – having the sass and the confidence to get up there in front of an auditorium full of people, sing their hearts out, and nail it. It was just so uplifting.
They have it all in front of them. These are, I really think, our future leaders, our future mothers. There is so much promise there. They all did such a wonderful job. Every girl, in her own way, had her own special thing. The costume designer was amazing, the woman who ran the play, the director, all of them – this was top quality.
And it was so cute after the show because they let the girls come out in their costumes and all the little girls who were there to watch looked up to them like they were real Broadway stars and asked for pictures with them. The little ones were a little afraid of Yardley because she was Ursula, but then they saw her big smile.
Yardley also had her best friend from the summers we spend at the Jersey Shore surprise her. When Yardley saw her, her jaw literally dropped. They cried. It was just so sweet.
All I could think last night was: This is the stuff life is made of.