Biking and Breaking

I must have been around the age of six or seven when this event occurred. Starting at the age of three, I was a dancer at Kathy’s Studio of Dance. This holds mainly positive memories with me, however if there was one annoyance with Kathy’s Studio of Dance, it was their strict policy in regard to costumes.

One day I was riding my bike with my childhood best friend, Nicole, and her dad, Tim. We were riding behind the baseball backstop at E.C. Hughes Park when I decided to accelerate over the slippery gravel. Unsurprisingly—but a shock at the time—my front tire of my pink, post-training-wheeled bicycle lost traction and launched me to the ground. I must have landed fairly hard because my knee began to bleed quite heavily. Of course I then began to sob, seeing my knee was hurt and my mother was not there for me to cry to. Like superman—my bicycle in one arm and me in the other—Tim carried me to my houses and my father bandaged up my knee with two bandages, to ensure the blood stay contained.

Later that evening, I found myself sitting in the backstage dressing rooms, heavy in anticipation for my cue to head to the stage. Looking back on it, waiting backstage with my fellow dance classmates was quite an odd experience. Our dance teachers insisted on fitting as many young dancers in each dressing room as possible, both boys and girls. We all sat atop tarps placed on the hard concrete floor of the dressing room. Like baby sardines, we were to sit in these close quarters, careful not to speak too loud for fear we would get in trouble for disruption.

Around fifteen minutes prior to performing, I recall looking down at my knee and spotting a blemish on the perfectly-pink ballerina tights I had on. The blood from my cut had forced its way past the Band-Aid barrier and onto my tights. Seeking sympathy, I brought this to one of my dance teacher’s attention. Sympathy, however, was far from what I received. Apparently to the studio, any disturbance of any costume piece must be repair or replaced—as if my blemished tights would ruin the recital.

Before I knew it, my dance teacher began to undress me in front of the dozens of children crammed into the dressing room.  My bare bottom was exposed for some time while the Band-Aids were being replaced. If this wasn’t mortifying enough, my dance teacher proceeded to delay the process more so when struggling to put my mandatory extra pair of tights on my handicapped leg. Re-bandaged and eager to dance, I headed to the stage where I imagine I danced the way a cute seven-year-old would

In the end, the whole process was sure to not have exceeded five minutes, however those five minutes remain some of the most humiliating minutes from my lifetime.