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Giselle
Itried getting better about locking the door to the studio.
Even when class was in session.
I sometimes let it slip, though.
The police had informed me there were a few more reported incidents like mine in the area that same night. No one was ever fatally injured so I wondered if they were taking it as seriously as I hoped they were. They assured me they were, so all I could do was go about my normal routines and hope nothing happened in the meantime.
Thankfully, it was Sunday and I was home for the day, so I had nothing to worry about. The bad part was, I had to call my mother.
I loved my mom, I really did. But I broke her heart when I left New York and the big stage. I thought opening a studio would make her happy, and it eased her a little that I was not completely turning my back on ballet. She wanted me on the stage, like her, though.
She no longer danced full time, but she was the great GalenaMetrovik. If she wanted to dance, she did, and the people around her bent over backward to make it happen. I was supposed to be her legacy and the act she contributed to the arts once she was no longer a performer.
Once I left, she cried, worried that the family name would never be known on the stage again. It was hard to explain to her that in a community that she was so revered in, I was the shadow. I was expected to be as good as she was, as perfect as she was.
Don't get me wrong, I was gifted beyond measure, and I knew it. Somehow, I could never outperform the expectations though. Oftentimes, I was belittled by my peers who thought I only got the parts I did because of who my mother was. I never knew if that was true.
I didn't stick around long enough to find out.
After battling mental breakdowns, body issues, and a sudden wave of stage fright—probably because of the aforementioned issues—I walked out. I spent a month with my mom in her New York apartment trying to feel better. We talked out the issues and I saw a doctor. She and I both thought that eventually, I would return to the stage.
But after that month, I ventured out to a bar with the one friend I knew I had in New York. We were reuniting after my breakdown and that was supposed to be my "thank goodness I am better" celebration. After a few drinks, I noticed a map on the wall and people were throwing darts at it.
The sign above it said, "You are here," with a big red dot over New York City. Below there was a sign that said, "Now, where are you going next?"
I walked over, entranced by the idea and wondered if everyone that threw a dart really visited or went where their dart landed. When I asked for a turn, my friend laughed and said it sounded like fun. But I took it as a sign. I had rolled the idea of moving and starting over in my head. I had even dreamt of staying with ballet and everything I knew but using the talent in other ways—like owning my own studio.
So I closed my eyes and threw the dart. Before opening my eyes I said to myself that the city closest to my dart (because I was not a small town kind of girl) would be where I would go.
The dart landed on Ty Ty, Georgia. As I sat that Sunday afternoon, staring at the ceiling of my Atlanta apartment, and thinking back on that day, the irony was mind blowing. Ty Ty, Georgia is directly in between Atlanta and Jacksonville, FL but I never considered Jacksonville because the dart was in Georgia and I was going to stay true to the dart.
After that night out, I broke the news to my mom and she cried. But once she stopped, she hugged me and told me she wished me well. I haven’t seen her since but not because I didn’t want to. Opening and running a business is time consuming and hard. I had dedicated my last year to being successful in Atlanta.
Mom had yet to come visit and I was assuming a part of that was being in denial. Despite her well wishes, I knew she was hurt. I was about to find out if her visiting was possible, because I was about to call her and ask her to come to Atlanta for our December show.
I picked my phone up and nervously hit my mom's name, not daring to use FaceTime since I was not put together the way she would have hoped I would be.
"Darling?" she answered, with her perfect enunciation.
"Hello, mom," I said happily, hoping it didn't sound as fake as it felt. "How are you?"
"Good, good. Just left brunch with Marie and Antonia." She spoke like I knew them but I didn't. Chances were, she didn't know them well either. Mom was a sucker for stuffy Sunday brunches with affluent people that attended her shows.
"Are you dancing right now?"
"No dear, just thinking about filling in for the lead in La Bayadere. You know I can do that with my eyes closed but just not sure yet."
She could. She really could. Most would think the life of a prima ballerina ends at a younger age; and that is most likely true since the average age of a dancer is 30.
Galena Metrovik was the exception to the rule. She was only 45 years old and did not look a day over 30. She got pregnant with me when she was nineteen and still in St. Petersburg, Russia at The Vaganova School. Her parents were from there and had sent her because they knew how good she was.
They didn't expect her to get pregnant and if I am being honest, I think my mom would have aborted me if she was not in a foreign country and knew how to go about it over there. Instead, she did not tell a soul—not her parents and not even my father. She was close to graduating and decided to hide the pregnancy as long as she could until she returned home to the United States.
She often joked that I was dancing before I was ever born and I guess that was true. Without a father, I was given her last name and thankfully, my grandparents helped her raise me while she climbed in her career. It wasn’t until they passed away, when I was nine, that I lived with my mom full time.
They left my mom all their money and assets and it made living her dream and raising me plausible. I always admired my mom when I was growing up. She taught me a lot and took the time to ensure I always had what I needed. But she never gave up her own dream.
