Why was it I never realized when I was able to run wild and free that I was experiencing happiness? Why did I think back then, that happiness was always just ahead in the future, when I would be an adult, able to make my own decisions, go my own way, be my own person? Why had it seemed that being a child was never enough? Why had I thought that happiness reserved itself for those grown to full size?
"You're looking sad," said Chris, who was crowded close beside me, with Cory on the other side of him, and Carrie on the other side of me. Nowadays Carrie was my little shadow to follow where I led, and mimic what I did, and imitate the way she thought I felt--just as Chris had his small mimicking shadow too, in Cory. If there were ever four siblings closer than we were, they would have had to have been Siamese quadruplets.
"Aren't you going to answer me?" asked Chris. "Why are you looking so sad? The trees look beautiful, don't they? When it's summer, I like summer best; yet when fall comes, I like fall best, and when winter comes, then that's my favorite season, and then comes spring, and I think spring is best."
Yes, that was my Christopher Doll. He could make do with the here and now, and always think it best, no matter what the circumstances.
"I was thinking back to old Mrs. Bertram and her boring talk of the Boston Tea Party. She made history seem so dull, and the people so unreal. Yet, I'd like to be bored like that again."
"Yeah," he agreed, "I know what you mean. I thought school a bore, too, and history a dull subject, particularly American history--all but the Indians, and the old West. But at least when we were in school, we were doing what other kids our ages did. Now we're just wasting time, doing nothing Cathy, let's not waste one minute! Let's prepare ourselves for the day we get out. If you don't set your goals firmly in mind, and strive always to reach them, then you never do. I'll convince myself if I can't be a doctor, then I won't want to be anything else, or want anything more that money can buy!"
He said that so intensely. I wanted to be a prima ballerina, though I would settle for something else. Chris scowled as if reading my mind. He turned his summer-blue eyes on me and scolded because I hadn't practiced my ballet exercises once since I'd come upstairs to exist. "Cathy, tomorrow I'm attaching a bane in the portion of the attic we've finished decorating-- and five or six hours each day, you are going to practice, just like in ballet class!"
"I am not! Nobody is going to tell me I have to do anything! Besides, you can't do ballet positions unless you are properly dressed for it!"
"What a stupid thing to say!"
"That's because I am stupid! You, Christopher, have all the brains!" With that I burst into tears and fled from the attic, racing past all the paper flora and fauna. Run, run, run for the stairs. Fly, fly, fly down the steep and narrow wooden steps, daring fate to make you fall. Break a leg, a neck, put you in a coffin dead. Make everybody sorry then; make them cry for the dancer I should have been.
I threw myself down on my bed and sobbed into the pillow. There was nothing here but dreams, hopes--nothing real. I'd grow old, ugly, never see lots of people again. That old man downstairs could live to be a hundred and ten! All those doctors would keep him living forever--and I would miss out on Halloween--no tricking, no treating, no parties, no candy. Oh, I felt sorry for myself, and I vowed somebody was going to pay, pay, pay for all of this, somebody was, somebody was!
Wearing their dirty white sneakers, they came to me, my two brothers, my small sister, and each sought to give me comfort with small gifts of cherished possessions: Carrie's red and purple crayons, Cory's Peter Rabbit story book; but Chris, he just sat and looked at me. I never felt so small
One evening quite late, Momma came in with a large box that she put in my hands to open. There amidst sheets of white tissue were ballet costumes, one a bright pink, the other azure-blue, with leotards and toe shoes to match the tulle tutus. "From Christopher," was written on the enclosed small card. And there were records of ballet music. I started to cry as I flung my arms around my mother, then around my brother. This time they weren't tears of frustration, or despair. Now I had something to work toward.
"I wanted most of all to buy you a white costume," said Momma, still hugging me. "They had a beauty in a size too large to fit you, and with it comes a tight cap of white feathers that curl over your ears-- for Swan Lake--and I ordered it for you, Cathy. Three costumes should be enough to give you inspi- ration, shouldn't they?"
Oh, yes! When Chris had the bane nailed securely to an attic wall, I practiced for hours on end while the music played. There wasn't a large mirror behind the bane, like there had been in the classes I had attended, but there was a huge mirror in my mind, and I saw myself as Pavlova, performing before ten thousand enraptured people, and encore after encore I took, bowing and accepting dozens of bouquets, every one red roses. In time, Momma brought me every one of Tchaikovsky's ballets to play on the record player, which had been hooked up to a dozen extension cords, which went down the stairs and plugged into a socket in our bedroom.
Dancing to beautiful music took me out of myself, and made me forget momentarily that life was passing us by. What did it matter when I was dancing? Better to pirouette and pre- tend I had a partner to support me when I did the most difficult positions. I'd fall, get up, then dance on again until I was out of breath and ached in every muscle, and my leotards were glued to me with sweat, and my hair was wet. I'd fall down flat on the floor to rest, and pant, then up again at the bane to do plies. Sometimes I would be the Princess Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty and sometimes I'd dance the part of the prince, as well, and leap high into the air and beat my feet together.
Once I looked up from my concluding dying swan spasms, and I saw Chris standing in the attic shadows, watching with the oddest expression on his face. Soon he'd be having a birthday, his fifteenth. How had it come about that already he seemed a man and not a boy? Was it only that vague look in his eyes that said he was moving quickly from childhood?
On full pointe I performed a sequence of those very small, even steps which are supposed to give the impression
the dancer is gliding across the stage and creating what is poetically called "a string of pearls." In such a way I flitter-glided over to Chris and held out my arms. "Come, Chris, be my danseur; let me teach you the way."
He smiled, seeming bemused, but he shook his head and said that was impossible. "Ballet dancing is not for me. But I'd like to learn to waltz--if the music is Strauss."
He made me laugh. At that time the only waltz music we had (except ballet) were old Strauss records. I hurried over to the record player to take off the Swan Lake records, and I put on The Blue Danube.
Chris was clumsy. He held me awkwardly, as if embarrassed. He stepped on my pink pointe shoes. But it was touching how hard he tried to get simple steps right, and I couldn't tell him all his talents must reside in his brain, and in the skill of his artistic hands, for certainly none of it drifted down to his legs and feet. And yet, and yet, there was something sweet and endearing about a Strauss waltz, easy to do, and romantic, and so unlike those athletic ballet waltzes that put you in a sweat, and left you panting for breath.
When Momma finally came through the door with that smashing white outfit for dancing Swan Lake, a beautifully feathered brief bodice, tight cap, white slippers, and white leotards so sheer the pink of my skin showed through, I gasped!
Oh, it seemed that love, hope, and happiness could be brought upstairs in one single giant-sized slipperysatin white box with a violet ribbon and given to me by someone who really cared when another who really cared, put this idea in her head.
"Dance, Ballerina, dance, and do your pirouette
In rhythm with your aching heart,
Dance, Ballerina, dance, you mustn't once forget A dancer has to dance the part,
Once you said his love must wait its turn,
You wanted fame instead, I guess that's your concern,
We live and learn. . . and love is gone, Ballerina, gone. . ."