Student Spotlight on John and Jeanne Stray

Sometimes the dancing bug bites at a young age, and sometimes the bug takes a while to find its way to someone. For this month’s student spotlight article, we changed it up a bit by talking to a couple who met via dancing. Their backgrounds are so completely different and yet a shared passion for dance grew into a real-world love for each other. These are the stories of John and Jeanne Stray.

A police officer, John is a tough guy born from a tough background. He started out in Texas as one of five kids being raised by a single mom. When he was seven years old, his father – who was a merchant marine – came back home and moved the entire family to Centralia, away from all other extended family. His dad was in and out of prison, leaving John and his siblings to work the farm with their mom. It didn’t leave much time on the side for anything else, but that didn’t stop John from dreaming. His next-door neighbors in Centralia had kids who attended the Linda Wagner School of Dance, and John remembers watching them practice. He fantasized about dancing all throughout his childhood, but his motivation growing up was to get out of Centralia and to stay out of jail – unlike his dad.

In 1982 he graduated from the Police Academy and started to work his way up the hierarchy. Eventually he was able to move from evening and night shifts to daytime shifts, and this new schedule gave him the opening he needed to finally take his first dance lessons at a country bar in Moscow, ID. About a decade later he was hired by the Seattle Police Department and moved to Federal Way, where he was once again placed on night shifts and had to give up his dancing dreams for a bit. It wasn’t until 2001 that he came across a huge group of people amassed in a parking lot in what he thought was a bar-fight moved outside. When he got closer he realized they were just a bunch of dancers, excitedly chatting about their dance lessons that evening at the Arthur Murray Dance Studio located in that parking lot’s strip mall. The dancing bug bit John again, and he started up dancing at that studio.

He danced at Arthur Murray’s for several years, all the while trying to keep it a secret from his police coworkers. Eventually Arthur Murray even offered him a job as a basic level instructor, which John tried for a while. But as time went on, he outgrew Arthur Murray’s and began looking to take his dancing to the next level. That led him to Pacific Ballroom Dance Studio in Auburn.

 

Jeanne’s story is quite different from John’s. She had always wanted to dance but in her youth she never had the opportunity. As an adult, she planned on starting to dance once her kids got out of those early years, but life had a different idea. When her kids were just 6 and 7 years old, she was widowed, and found herself struggling to make ends meet as a single mom with two young kids. That meant her dream of learning to dance would have to take a back seat for a while.

Finally when her kids had reached their teen years and didn’t rely on her so much, she was able to carve out a little bit of personal time for herself. Her job was stressful, and raising two kids on her own wasn’t easy, so she needed to find an outlet that could provide some mental clarity. Jeanne soon discovered that dancing did just that. She started out by learning Salsa, but soon found she needed more complexity to keep her motivated. In 2011 she ventured into Pacific Ballroom Dance Studio and found that the ballroom dance atmosphere was just what she needed. At first she didn’t have a partner and just took group classes on her own.

Then one night, Jeanne attended a social dance at Pacific Ballroom Dance. She danced with a guy that she described as being a great lead. “We moved well together,” she said. “It was flowy, easy and free. I felt good! I told [him] that if he ever considered looking for a dance partner, I was available!”

John, meanwhile, had attended that same social at Pacific Ballroom Dance with a date. Despite being at that dance with another woman, John was swept away when he saw Jeanne. “She was so pretty!” he exclaimed. The moment she whispered that she would be available as a dance partner, John was hooked.

But their partnership didn’t happen right away. It took some time before John was able to get nights off to attend the same group classes that Jeanne was going to. And Jeanne, meanwhile, wasn’t looking for anything more than a dance partnership. But, Jeanne recalled with a smile, “John was very persistent.” They partnered up to perform in the adult formation team of one of Pacific Ballroom Dance’s showcases and enjoyed working together so much that they decided to take their dancing further.

Or, as John put it, “It took a year but I eventually… ran into my love again. I asked her to dance and we have been together since!”

 

Although they enjoyed social dancing – and still do, to this day! – they soon started to look for something more. At the time, although Jeanne was living in Federal Way, she worked in Bellevue, and found a studio near her work named Impulse Ballroom. John started to drive up to Bellevue to meet her for lessons with Impulse Ballroom’s owners, Stephen and CoraLyn Uczekaj.

“Stephen and CoraLyn were big influences on me,” John said. “I quickly learned how little I really knew about dance and I wanted more.”

For John, though, ballroom dancing was more than just a challenge. It was also cathartic, helping him to recover from some rather rough injuries he acquired while on his policing job, and acting as a “purge valve”. He’s had a ruptured ACL, PCL, a torn meniscus, and a torn rotator cuff. After three surgeries, he made it a goal to come back to dancing and see how far he and Jeanne could take it.

“I still remember taking a group class from Stephen at Impulse Ballroom,” John explained. “My left hand was in my pocket, he finally asked why I wasn’t offering my hand to my partner.  I had to confess: ‘I can’t lift my arm.’  Those surgeries were lows I needed to come back from.”

He added, “Dancing has probably saved my life. When I dance I float above the abuse I saw as a kid and the scars that 37 years on the street dealt me.”

In 2016, Impulse Ballroom closed down and Stephen and CoraLyn joined the team at Aria Ballroom. John and Jeanne followed them to Aria, where “the learning and expectation went up another notch,” Jeanne said. “The combination of the teachers’ encouragement, and the excitement of dance performances at Aria’s showcases and the Seattle Star Ball inspired us to consider training for competition.  Life is short, and we want some of those excitements in our lives.  Dancing is a sport because it requires athleticism, discipline, dedication and skill.  Ballroom dance is an art form.  I love all aspects of this dance sport with an emphasis on elegance and beauty of the dance.”

“I still like social dancing,” John interjected, “but I am really liking how much competition pushes and improves my dancing.   After three years of rehabilitation, I really want to see if I can complete, you never know what tomorrow might bring.”

When we asked John and Jeanne what their favorite dances were, they both had the same answer: “It’s always changing!”

But John still confessed, “I like Waltz and Foxtrot. I think I have a taste for older music. I also like Rumba.   If I was in Heaven, and if I could dance forever, I would want the variety.”

“Right now, Foxtrot is my favorite dance,” said Jeanne, “because I feel that I don’t need to work as hard as the other dances. I feel the characteristics of the dance.  I feel that our movements have the jazzy long continuous movements as they should.”

Although John and Jeanne are currently training in International Standard and Latin, they actually focused on American Smooth and Rhythm for a long time. We asked them why they made the switch, and what it is about ballroom dancing in general that keeps them inspired.

“Yes, (at the beginning) we were trying out too many styles of dances,” Jeanne responded. “It’s hard to master one style when we take on too many.  We decide to focus on Standard and Latin for now. But to me, American Smooth is an artistic style of creating lines and figures with self-expression.  I find that very challenging because the dance requires one to put him/herself out there to create the beautiful movements.  The dance is captivating to watch when it’s done correctly. Perhaps over time, we can pick up Smooth again.  I’m being optimistic.”

“I used to do Smooth and Rhythm socially mostly,” said John, “but I was struck at the body control and frame required for International Standard.  I am still learning and unlearning bad habits, but I love the journey. Likewise I love International Rumba because power and energy are formed so much differently from the American-style knee action.   I feel like there may be more power and it is generated from more hip and body mechanisms.  But that could also be the difference between social and competitive dancing.”

Their goals are competitive in nature for both of them. In the short term, John wants to finish his Latin routines and compete at this year’s Summit Dancesport Competition in both Standard and Latin, which is coming up at the end of September. But longer term, he would like to continue competing in two or three competitions per year and maybe even pick up a bit of Smooth again.

“It’s better to aim high and miss than to aim low and hit it!” John exclaimed.

Jeanne’s goals mirror John’s, although with a more pragmatic tone. “John and I are getting older and slowly losing our flexibility as we age.  Our short term goal is to do more competitions while we can, and our long term goal is to keep dancing.”

When we asked them what they enjoy most about learning at Aria Ballroom, they were both similarly enthusiastic. John jumped in first:

“I love Aria for lots of reasons but mostly because the teachers are really top notch.  I truly believe that some of the best dancers I have seen are in this studio. With that said. They say: ‘Nobody cares how much you know until they know how much you care.’ I feel like Aria Ballroom truly cares about giving their students the best experience and yet still provides a tough teaching standard. For me, to care is to push me. Tough love is still love!”

Jeanne added, “I haven’t met a teacher at Aria that I don’t like.  Not only do they have tons of knowledge about dancing, but they are helpful, supportive and look out for their students. They focus more on technique, execution of the steps, and movements. That’s what I want to learn.  They inspire me to keep learning.”

We love having John and Jeanne in the studio. From their private lessons to the social dance floor, they are always a joy to have around. A huge thank you to them both for opening up about their backgrounds and experiences with dancing!