Twice a week, I lay down on a black table with an oval shape cut out of it for my face to rest in. I’m in physical therapy twice a week for lingering issues from having shingles. The ballerina in my head loses her spot of focus and tumbles over. ![]() I’m a child, dressed as the desire of my personal monster. I’m a child, dressed as the centerfold of every man’s desire. I start the song over and drive back home.Īfter my oldest leaves for school and my husband leaves for work, I search for the photo. I find it, my stomach churning at the studio portrait of me wearing the pristine ballet costume. “You’re such a weirdo, Mom, but I love you,” he says as the bus pulls up. “I was thinking about doing pirouettes to this song when I was a little girl.” His face sharply comes into focus, the hint of his dimple my spot to focus on. “Mom,” I look over, my son looking at me with teenage annoyance, “where’d you go? You zoned out for a second there.” The sleepy ballerina inside me straightens her posture, ready to spin. My son has never heard it before and twists the knob to turn the volume up. The amazing thing about technology is that when your chosen list runs out, it keeps playing songs from the same genre, even if you didn’t add the song.Ī few minutes before the sun glows on the horizon, ‘Catch a Falling Star’ fills the car. We have a playlist labeled ‘Crooners’ that he and I listen to, waiting for him to discover a song so old he’s never heard it before. Last year, while my car sat idle in the pre-dawn darkness at the bus stop, my fourteen year old son took over the playlist. I absorbed these images to use as a spot to focus on later that night when my grandfather wrapped a hand around a long lock of my loose curls. At the end of their driveway, I would pirouette to Perry Como crooning ‘Catch a Falling Star’ from a car radio, patiently waiting to make shapes out of the vapor clouds. My grandparent’s home was near the Indian River, close enough to see the wide, clear sky over the water, and close enough to watch shuttles launch from Cape Canaveral. I’m dressed as a bunny, the dance studio’s innocent version of a centerfold. There is a studio photograph of me from that time in my ballet recital costume. On nights I lay awake, unable to sleep from the flashbacks, snippets of my early ballet days co-mingle together with the nightmare. That little ballerina lives inside my brain, even now, pirouetting towards the beauty of her life, her costume covering her abused, broken body. The same couch I focused on when my grandfather would pin me down and rape me on the ground in between the exercise bike and the couch while the television blared next to us. The carpet on the floor I stared at twice a week had the same exact pattern and texture as the couch in my grandparent’s Florida room. But it’s not the only reason I had to count my breath, focus on one spot, and meditate through the inhales and exhales while laying face down and digging my fingernails into the palms of my hands. On the table at physical therapy, I found one spot on the floor and focused with all my might. I could spin indefinitely, so long as I didn’t lose sight of that spot. As you spin, immediately finding and re-focusing on that same spot. The idea is to focus on one spot – usually on the wall – as your body twirls around, not turning your head until the very last second. ![]() ![]() Tears burned my eyes as the physical therapist dry needled my shoulder blade trying to wake up dead muscles and nerves, signaling my brain to breathe deeply.Īs a young ballerina, I was taught early on to find a spot across the room to focus on intently while learning to pirouette. Last year, I went to physical therapy twice a week for lingering issues due to a bout of shingles.įor two days out of every seven, I laid on a black table with an oval shape cut out of it for my face to rest in. ***I’ve used the beginning of this essay in another one, in case it sounds familiar. The exhibit will be available for viewing through the end of the month. ![]() This essay, along with this ballerina outfit, was used as part of the ‘What I Wore’ exhibit for Sexual Assault Awareness Month at the LSU Student Union Art Gallery.
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