A Lotus Grows in the Mud Read online

  Then all too suddenly, the music is over. Its vibration lingers in the air for a moment before fading to silence. The dancers stand like statues in the spotlights.

  Applause roars like a sea in my ears. The air is now charged with a new electricity, that of adulation. As everyone claps madly, I soak up the tremendous energy while each member of the chorus walks to the front of the stage and graciously takes a bow, accepts the outpouring of praise. But I am lost. What do I do now? When am I supposed to get up? When am I supposed to take my bow?

  Sitting there as prettily as I can, looking across at my mother, who is clapping wildly too, I try without success to elicit a signal from her as to when I should get up to take my bow. Should I wait till the next group, perhaps? I look in the wings for Monsieur, the director of the ballet, but he is nowhere to be seen. The last line of the chorus takes their final bow and runs off the stage. It is only me and Alicia Alonso and the premier dancer left on the stage. I’m panicked, frozen, lost as to what to do next. I can’t possibly go now, I think, as Alicia and the male lead bow to a standing ovation.

  I can see Alicia’s chest rising and falling under her leotard as she tries to catch her breath. Those in the front row of the audience step up and throw long-stemmed roses at her. A single perfect rosebud lands near my feet and I cradle it in my hand. This must be my cue to take my bow.

  I slowly rise, placing one foot in front of the other just like the prima ballerina. Stepping forward, I join the two stars at the front of the stage and begin my curtsy.

  Alicia Alonso senses my presence. She smiles down at me, and hands me a rose. “Bravo,” she says, and kisses me on the cheek.

  A cheer goes up from the crowd as I reach out and take it. A whole new roar of applause comes like a wave, enveloping me. I think to myself, Is that for me? For a moment, I am completely overwhelmed.

  I glance toward the wings, beaming, and see the stage manager waving his hands about like a wild man, his face twisted into a grotesque mask, slapping his thighs repeatedly and yelling something at me. He must be pleased with my performance; after all, I did exactly as I was told. Behind him stands my mother, laughing openly. Emboldened by her expression of pride and joy, I stay right where I am, curtsying from the waist repeatedly to the crowd.

  I flounce off the stage like the ballerina I now know I want to become. Running, grinning, crying, I fly into the open arms of my mother, the sound of applause still lapping against my ears.

  “What were you thinking?” the stage manager screams at me as soon as my mother releases me from her embrace. “You weren’t supposed to take a bow with Madame!”

  My mother rounds on him. “Oh, for Christ’s sake!” she yells. “You only gave the child five minutes to learn the whole routine! What do you expect?”

  “Nobody told me what to do at the end,” I pipe up anxiously.

  My mother takes my hand and we walk past the stage manager. She shoots him a smile and says, “Get ahold of yourself. The audience loved her.”

  Dancing gave me something I very much needed as a child, especially as I was never going to excel academically. It allowed me to overcome my physical awkwardness as a little girl.

  It wasn’t a question of confidence; I had that in spades. My mother always told people proudly, “Goldie doesn’t know a stranger,” because whenever anyone came to our house I’d march straight up to them and kiss them.

  And I always knew what I would become. “Goldie will dance, that is what Goldie will do,” Mom would announce if anyone asked her what I would do when I grew up. She shared my unshaken belief in my life’s path.

  I owe so much of who I am to my dancing. I learned about timing and personal discipline. I learned about my own physicality. I pushed the limits of what I could or could not do. Through rigorous exercise in my early years I developed muscles, posture and, most important, I learned what it is to sweat.

  When I danced, I felt absolutely grounded, at the peak of my physical strength. The music went right through me. It changed the way I felt about myself. It lifted my heart and made me want to fly through the air, slicing and dicing it all around me. That’s what I lived for. That’s what gave me everything. I was no longer disabled by my fear of being different, being out of step. Just as Alicia Alonso rose above her disability, so did I.

  If we can give our children something other than a dependence on their social or academic life, we allow them to own something precious that is entirely their own. It can be dance or sport or art or singing or photography or anything that they can find themselves in. By giving them something to excel in and taking them away from the daunting peer group pressure of the playground, they can transcend the everyday slings and arrows of childhood.

  For me, dancing provided a physical euphoria that nothing else would ever touch. Anything after that felt like a cheap trick. To push yourself to the physical and mental limits, to ask yourself to deliver more than you think you possibly can and to come through, is the greatest high there is.

  compassion

  If we can cultivate compassion for those who have hurt us, we have the possibility of overcoming our anger, pain and fear. Compassion is a great medicine.

  I can hear the tiny silver bells adorning my mother’s cone-shaped hat tinkle each time she moves around the kitchen. Mouthwatering aromas fill the air, and the windows are steamed with cooking. It is Christmas Eve, 1956, that most magical of nights, and I am eleven years old.

  “Goldie, honey, light the candles,” Mom calls through the dining-room hatch. To my older sister, she says, “Patti, dear, would you please come in here and help carry something out?”

  Christmas at our house is always special. Overlooking her Jewish heritage for this particular holiday, my mother relishes any excuse to have a party. The house is full of people, and, as usual, she is cooking up a storm. On her head is this year’s creation, a homemade red felt hat with a strap under her neck and covered with dozens of hand-sewn-on bells.

  Patti wanders through from the kitchen with a dish of scalloped potatoes to add to a dining-room table already groaning with vegetables, meats and different kinds of bread. In pride of place stands my mother’s famous green dessert made with lime Jell-O and nuts. I light the candles and gaze happily into their flickering light, my stomach rumbling at the sight of my mother’s huge ham, baked and honey-basted, bubbling with brown sugar and decorated with pineapples, cherries and cloves that look like perfect flowers.

  I always want Christmas to be like this, but I know things are about to change. Patti, who is eight years older than me, is going off to college soon, and this will be the last Christmas I can really be a child. I am not ready to take the baton. I so want to remain the little girl, the funny, goofy, innocent little sister. I dread the idea of suddenly being older, which means to me that very soon Christmas would mean only having my friends over for the festivities on Christmas Eve. As much as I love David and Jimmy Fisher and Jean Lynn, the prospect of having just them in the house seems dull and empty. No matter how much I try to feel the excitement of this Christmas, something already feels strange.

  My daddy is out working—he is always out working—playing his violin at a Christmas party for President Eisenhower in the White House. When he comes home late, he’ll sneak in and put the same present that he buys my mother every year under the tree—a bottle of Shocking, a perfume by Schiaparelli, picked up just as the shops are closing on Christmas Eve.

  Patti, whom I worship with her flaming hair, pinched-in waist and beautiful eyes, puts Frank Sinatra on the record player. The living room is filled with light and laughter as her friends gather round and share animated conversation. I love my sister’s girlfriends. I love to watch them walk into our house one by one, covered in snow, holding gifts and stamping their feet. They peel off their overcoats to reveal pencil-straight skirts and matching sweater sets, perfect bobbed hair, perfect red lips. They all have beautiful hair, and they smell so good. Most impressive of all, they have breasts, when all I
have are two little buds.

  Come on now, boys,” Mom cries as she emerges from the kitchen wiping her hands, “it’s time to get the tree in.”

  Several of Patti’s male friends put down their glasses of eggnog and noisily go out on the front porch to lift it up onto their shoulders and bring it in.

  “Where do you want it this year, Mrs. Hawn?” one of them asks.

  “Over in the corner by the side door, honey.” Mom points. “Then, in the new year, I can just toss it out, and the hell with it.”

  Everyone pitches in, pulling and tugging and dragging the huge tree into the house, its thick, scented arms weighed down with snow.

  “And, heave!” one of the boys shouts. “Heave!”

  In no time at all, the tree is screwed into its holder and standing tall, its tip scraping the ceiling. Laughing like children, everyone gathers around to trim the tree, throwing sparkling strands of tinsel all over it.

  I put the tinsel on strand by strand—my favorite part…my face buried deep in the tree’s intoxicating needles that remind me of Christmases past, I peel each strand off and lay it on the floor, ready to replace it perfectly when the time comes.

  Mom drags in a big old box full of the ornaments she and Daddy have had forever, each one with its own story.

  “This was our first,” she tells me, holding up a pretty glass bauble. “This was the one when we ran the boarding house on Thirteenth Street.” One by one, we put them on the tree.

  “There!” Mom cries with delight, as we all stand back to admire our handiwork and Dan, my sister’s handsome friend, switches on the lights.

  I gaze up in awe. I love the sparkly things, the glass baubles and the red and gold balls. But, best of all, I love the way the lights change the color of the room. Looking around, I see them reflected in the faces and eyes of everyone I know and love. All is right with my world.

  Suddenly, the tree shudders, as if it is about to sneeze, and then topples headlong toward us all, crashing spectacularly to the floor.

  “For Christ’s sake, what was that?” Mom growls as we all gasp.

  Someone forgot to lock the side door, and Jean Lynn’s brother, Joey, barrels in, knocking the tree down in the process.

  Everyone screams with laughter. “All right, now, let’s get started over again,” Mom laughs. Seeing Joey’s red face, she says, “Okay, Joe. Let’s have some eggnog.”

  Everyone laughs, and Patti’s friends get the giggles with Joey while the boys hoist the tree back up. Before we can say Santa Claus, it is decorated perfectly again, the door locked securely behind it. People help themselves to the food my mother has so lovingly prepared, and someone puts on another Christmas carol.

  “Deck the halls with boughs of holly…” I hear its familiar words and feel a lump in my throat.

  Not wanting to let this piece of my childhood go for anything, I give in to the calling to go to bed early, while the party is at its peak. If I go to my room now, I can lie in bed and fall asleep listening to the sounds of music and laughter and Christmas below.

  I make my way around the room, kissing Mom and Patti and her friends and our neighbors good night. Kissing, kissing everyone; always loving to be kissed back.

  “Good night, Goldie. Do you still believe in Santa Claus?”

  “Oh yes!”

  “Are you ready for Christmas, Goldie?”

  “Yes, yes, I’m so excited.”

  “Good night, Mommy.”

  “Well, off you go to bed now, honey. And, before you know it, Santa will be here.”

  I don’t really believe in Santa Claus anymore, but I pretend to because I still want to play the surprised little Goldie in the morning. I want to come down and cry “Oh!” when I see my gifts piled up under the tree, the brightly colored Christmas lights illuminating the shiny wrapping paper.

  I walk up the stairs slowly, step by step, looking back at all our friends and the food and the noise. This is such a special Christmas Eve; I can feel that, and I never want it to end. Taking another step, my fingers on the banister, I can’t wait for the morning, when I wake up to a sleeping house and creep out of my bedroom. Taking my seat halfway down the stairs, I will sit and peer through the balusters at the pretty lights shining on the walls, filling the living room with an ethereal glow. With just the flick of my head, I will be able to see the tree itself, not just its glow, and see the gifts under it for the first time. But first, I savor the delicious sense of anticipation, wanting to hang on to the moment for as long as I can.

  Reaching my little green room at the top of the stairs, I slip off my clothes and pull on my nightie. I tuck my favorite toy, a small turquoise dog, under his covers on the chair next to the bed. Then I slide into my own private envelope of crisp white sheets. Nobody has sheets like Mom’s. She starches them and then hangs them out to dry in the cold eastern air. They feel cool and clean against my skin.

  Sure enough, I lie awake for a while, watching the snow falling onto the flat roof outside my window. Happily, I think of the little squirrels I love to watch, tucked up in the hollows of the oak trees, their winter hoard of nuts safely stored away.

  I hear the chatter and the din from below, and I try to quell my tingling anticipation of the morning. Gradually, my eyelids grow heavy and my excitement abates. Finally, I drift off to sleep.

  I awaken with a start, and for a moment I don’t know where I am.

  “Wh-what?”

  Shaking my head of sleep, I realize that someone is very close to me in the semidarkness, kneeling by the side of my bed.

  The dark silhouette of a man is framed by the hallway landing light. He has slid his hands into my soft, warm bed and is fondling the new bumps on my chest. The presence of his cold fingers against my skin frightens me. Scarier still is when he moves farther down toward my groin.

  “Don’t! What are you doing? Stop it! Get out of here!” I cry, trying to push his hands away with both of mine. Then, “Wh-who are you?”

  Sitting up and blinking in the half-light, I can just make out the face of one of Patti’s school friends, a twenty-year-old guy I’ve known almost all my life.

  “I’m just wishing you Merry Christmas, Goldie,” he whispers, forcing his hands back under the covers. The smell of beer and cigarettes on his breath makes me feel sick.

  “Don’t! You shouldn’t be here!” I splutter, squirming under his wandering hands. “Get away, get away from me.”

  He closes his eyes and rolls his head back on his neck and starts to moan softly.

  Very frightened by his intensity, I cry out, as loud as I can, “Mom! Mommy! Help! Help me!” but no one answers.

  Startled, the young man jumps to his feet. He fiddles with his clothing, then flies down the stairs and out the front door, slamming it shut behind him. In sudden urgent need of my mother, I leap out of bed. Standing at the top of the stairs, I call for her breathlessly, “Mommy! Mommy!”

  One of the guests hears me and calls my mother. I look down through the balusters to see her smiling up at me from the foot of the stairs, my sister a few steps behind.

  “Yes, Goldie, what is it?” Mom asks, her brow furrowing when she sees the expression on my face.

  “Mommy,” I wail, my face crumpling. “There was someone in my room, and he was touching me.”

  All the bustle and noise of the house suddenly seems to freeze. Everyone stops talking, and all I can hear is “Here Comes Santa Claus” playing merrily on the record player. My mother makes the first move. In moments, she is up those stairs, followed closely by Patti and several friends. I run back into my bedroom and hide under the covers, crying, as they come in and snap on the light.

  “What happened, Goldie? Tell me what happened,” my mother says, her face strange.

  “He came into my room and he put his hands under my nightie and he touched me,” I explain, frightened by the expressions on their faces.

  “Where? Where did he touch you?”

  Embarrassed, I point. “Here and here
.”

  “Then what?”

  “Well, I screamed and he ran off and I jumped out of bed.”

  Frank, one of Patti’s male friends, suddenly points to a wet stain on the rug next to my bed. “Look at that!” he hisses. “The son of a bitch!”

  Behind my mother, I see Patti clamp her hand over her mouth in shock as Frank turns red with rage. “Who was it, Goldie? Who did this?” he asks through gritted teeth. I have never seen anyone so angry in my life.

  When I tell him, Frank rushes from the room and out the front door. The look of betrayal and incredulity on Patti’s face scares me. I hear the sound of others running down the quiet street where we live, shouting the boy’s name.

  I sit there nodding on my little bed, trembling. An unknown fear, a strange sense of violation, fills me. I no longer feel safe.

  My mother remains extremely calm. She takes me firmly by the shoulders and tells me to lie back down. In an urgent tone I’ve never heard before, she banishes everyone else from the room. Downstairs, I can hear the party breaking up as people speak in whispers or disappear off to their own homes.

  “Goldie, listen to me. That boy was sick. He’s gone now. You’re okay, that’s all that matters. Turn over now, honey, and let me tickle your back. Now, go back to sleep, and, before you know it, Christmas will be here.”

  All I cared about was that my mom was there and everything was going to be fine because she said so.

  She strokes my skin in rhythmic circles, rubbing and patting, rubbing and patting, just as I like it, and I begin to float off to the land of dreams, where nothing unpleasant ever happens.

  For a moment, in my half sleep, I struggle with a restless thought.

  “Mommy, are you still there?” I ask her, lifting my head to make sure she’s still there.

  “Yes, honey, I’m still here.”

  Sleep overcomes me and I drift away.

  The next morning, I wake at five o’clock and lie in bed, staring up at the ceiling. A dark thought slides through my mind. Did something strange happen last night, or did I just dream it? I can’t seem to remember. Looking out the window, I see giant flakes of snow softly bumping into one another beyond the glass. There is the oak tree, and there is the roof of the living room. But something has changed.