Dream

I received an announcement of graduation. I say an announcement, because the girl only mailed it a day before the ceremony, and the ceremony was on a Sunday. There was a picture of her from dancing in a contorted position, and she said she skipped an actual graduation party because of the dance academy she's been attending, and she plans to spend most of her time there until fall, when she'll move to LA and (hopefully) join a dance company.

Oh, the dreams of young people. Do you ever have that feeling? You know the odds are against her, and I hope she makes it.

Some parents impress upon their youngsters the need for college and a fallback career. The problem with a fallback plan is that you can't put one forth without actually putting in doubt that the youngster can't achieve the dream. You want to dance? Get a business degree. You want to sing? Get a nursing education. You want to write? Get an architect's license. You want to paint? Go to medical school.

The problem then becomes doubt. Your parents don't believe in you. Your teachers and friends can only push you so far - and after that you have to carry yourself. It's a dream. It's an art. These things can't be taught because it's an expression.

Don't get me wrong. There are schools out there to teach you form, technique, stamina, discipline. You might be technically perfect but you can't teach someone to have something to express. There are a lot of things that schools can teach you - and there are things you can achieve only on your own terms.

Doubt is very difficult to overcome. I wish the girl luck in her dancing. And then I remember how scattered I seem to be. Am I truly focused on my own writing goal? I could regale you with stories of my own fallback career. I could tell you about the way I was told I wouldn't have anything to say until I was older - still older than I am now. Yet the words come. I have things to say, and it seems I can't stop saying them. Yet I'm still trying to overcome the doubt. I wonder if I'm sending out the right messages to be heard, to be understood, to be shared. I wonder if my message is worth sharing.

Doubt is the path to madness. I need to express something, and words are my chosen medium. I want my young friend to make it as a dancer partly because I want to see someone make it without that fallback career plan. I want someone to not be touched by the doubt. I can't say that's me - I have one of those pieces of paper to represent a fallback career. Did it help me? It has shaped who I am, but I can't always say that it made me better.

Eye of the Beholder

Do you remember when your mother was the most beautiful woman in the world?

I witnessed a small girl, maybe 4 or 5, who looked at her mother and said, "You're beautiful!" Her mother smiled. Gave the child a hug. Yet something in the mother's eyes made me wonder what she really thought.

The earnest words of a child can be so powerful. Parents are supposed to think their children are beautiful. That was something I always believed as a child. But is the opposite also true? That the children are supposed to believe the parents are beautiful?

I have no doubt the little girl believed her words. Did the mother? Is it something peculiar about the person to believe or not believe the words spoken?

When you look in the mirror, what do you see? Women, especially, seem to fixate on their flaws. It's part of the problem with family. Can you look at someone who looks so much like you, a daughter, a mother, and see the beauty despite those pieces that you hate? It's a nose, eyes too close together, or even simple color.

There was a photo of my mother in a dress, hands on the column of a patio. Her smile showed her happiness, though I don't know when or where the picture was taken. I've heard her since lament her flaws, but I don't see them.

Is this the human part of the condition, where one is not allowed to see the beauty without vanity? That women cannot see it within themselves? Is it our culture, or is it something deeper?