Jenny's Story - Appendix D
Arabesque positions teach life skills
As a child, I was obsessed with ballet. My mother put me in ballet classes by age five, and I took to it like a fish takes to water. It just seemed easy to me. And through the encouragement and praise of my parents, I stuck with it my entire childhood. In San Jose, where I grew up, I had the support of my parents and my ballet instructors, who had known me since childhood. And though I was a senior in high school before I was finally selected to play Clara in our local ballet company's annual performance of
The Nutcracker.
I always had decent parts and steadily moved up through the ranks to more leading roles, and I was convinced that I would be the next prima ballerina at the Met or the Bolshoi.
Of course, none of that happened. And by the time I was ready for college, I realized that the best I would probably ever be, was a supporting dancer in the local semi-professional ballet company. I did manage to get into UCLA, which is prestigious enough. And they do have a very fine performing arts program. But living in LA, and attending an incredibly competitive university, turned out to be more than I could handle.
At UCLA, I was enrolled in their fine arts program. The first several weeks were a piece of cake. But by the third week of school, I slowly began to realize that I was in the company of some very serious competition. I had never met dancers before of this quality, and suddenly, I was just another dancer in a group of a hundred and fifty that all thought they were better than me.
My only consolation was that I made some very dear friends. One such friend, and fellow dancer, was Seth. He was a year older than me and frequently worked with me as my dance partner. He was from Oregon, and we almost immediately hit it off. We were practically the same height, me five foot seven, to Seth's five foot eight. I struggled to stay under a hundred and fifteen pounds, and Seth probably didn't weigh much more than one fifty. Which, for a male dancer, was pretty good. And we had many similar experiences growing up. The only major difference was that he was male.
The girls in most dance classes outnumber the boys nine to one. So, for male parts, you only had to be male. For the female parts, you had to beat out eight other girls fighting for the same part you wanted. That was a fact I had always been aware of, and for dancers, it was just a fact of life. Something you got used to. However, when Seth seemed to take an interest in me, I was very flattered, as I felt that I had just beaten out eight other girls.
That fall semester of my freshman year, I didn't actually date. I simply socialized with other fine arts majors as a group. We had our own parties and social events. Went to dinner together and to plays, operas, ballets, and other professional performances that were so readily available in the Los Angeles area. However, during the first month of the spring semester, Seth and I were eating together, with a dozen other fine arts geeks, at a local pizza place a few blocks from campus. I was too young to buy beer, but several others were not, and they would purchase pitchers of beer so that we could all share. Over several hours, I may have consumed an entire beer, which for me was a lot. I seldom drank beer, or anything high in calories, as I was always fighting to keep my weight down. But that particular night, I guess I just splurged.
The crowd slowly drifted off to wherever, ultimately leaving only Seth and me. With the pitcher empty, and everyone else heading to their respective apartments or dorm rooms, Seth offered to walk me back to my dorm. Which of course, I immediately agreed.
We were holding hands as we walked, and about two blocks from the campus, as we were stopped at a traffic light, Seth turned to me and said, "I guess this is where I ask,
Your place or mine?
"
I wasn't expecting this, but I think I had secretly been hoping for it for several months. I was quickly approaching nineteen years old, and I was still a virgin. I had dated in high school, and I'll admit, I kissed and necked with boys while on dates. But for some strange reason, I never let a single boy get his hand inside my shirt, much less my pants. So, standing on the sidewalk next to Seth, him holding my hand. And probably a little tipsy from drinking almost an entire beer. I thought to myself - what or who am I saving my virtue for?
The pedestrian crossing signal was still flashing '
Wait.'
But the moment it switched to '
Walk,'
I turned to him, and with big doe eyes, said, "Yours."
Seth instantly squeezed my hand, turned ninety degrees, and instead of crossing the street, we headed for wherever it was that he lived. After walking maybe five or six blocks, we arrived at a large three-story apartment complex. It was your typical Southern California garden-style apartment, with landscaped courtyards and multiple swimming pools. The only thing was that it was probably forty years old and had wholly morphed into student housing. Seth lived on the third floor, and with no elevator, Seth held my hand tightly as we trudged up every flight.
As we reached his apartment, before turning the key in the lock, Seth said, "I have two roommates, but I doubt they are here."
