Quotes

In real life, I was a sleepwalker-dance my only light.

For thirty years after this, I struggled with depression and my inability to handle it, I'd fall into the same trap over and over again. Raspberries, whipped cream, ice cream. Exercise would end. I would be embarrassed about my weight, so I'd stop going to class. Sleeping would become a problem....

"Dancing well is the best revenge".

Because of mother's belief in Christian Science, we didn't go to doctors. But when I was eight, she took me to one in Miami Beach. I was terrified. He looked at my feet and made footprints. I had absolutely flat feet. He said that I needed a little arch support and we put some in my shoes. The wedges bent my feet in an unusual way and it hurt, but it was necessary. In one month, my arches had lifted. My feet took on a brand-new shape. Something like a banana, with five grapes on top. Coincidentally, I took my first ballet class.

When a dancer walks into a rehearsal room, wall-to-wall mirrors are nearly always present and can serve as an immediate reference point as to one's appearance. In effect, the mirror acts like a second self, obligingly answering questions. "Do I look alright?" "Yes." In the famous fairy tale Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the evil queen questions her mirror and it answers honestly. During class or a practice session, a dancer might ask, "Mirror, mirror on the wall, Am I dancing well at all?" "Are you accusing me, or am I accusing myself?" "Am I too enveloped in your appraisal?" Yes, dancers yearn to be perfect, and mirrors are seductive. But when the curtain goes up, the classroom melts away. Dancers must go through the looking glass to give an ecstatic, fully realized performance.

As a child, I knew I had one great possession: My body. It was little and quick.