anote

If one day you find this... then you would know that it's for you, and I have written this for you and I had always intended for you to find this.

Hello, my name is Carmen Read.

Full name? Of course, Carmen Amanda Grace Read and there's a great story that goes well with that, like every thing else in my life... there's always a story. I am currently 22 years old, and sitting in my dinning room writing this while i am suppose to be doing my homework, but no surprise there huh?... perhaps when you find this I am doing the same thing... or actually not doing, not doing my homework I mean.

I am not good at doing some thing for a long period of time, perhaps a habit or a fear that restrains me at giving my very best but you already know that.

I have quick bursts of energy but if you ask me to run a marathon... I may have to ask you to piggy back me for most of the time, but then i would of course make some sort of remark of how i am too heavy and that i would break your back... and I will probably go off in some tantrum because I can't believe how great you are wanting to carry a fat hippo (maybe my bad eating habit will have caught up with me by then...) and i secretly give you that smile that says "you are giving me butterflies...and i might actually blush and i am too shy and too proud..." but you take none of this push and pull...you would laugh, throwing your head back in great joy... oh how you would laugh at my shyness and this brave face i put on every time.

you would say... "who would dare make you blush?" as if a question directed to the world but it was only to yourself because you know you would.

I never found comfort in my brave face, and never found safety in my pride... these are the walls I've built over the years.

Over the years of continually having people walk away from me, either in death or in lack of trust or simply the fact that I wasn't worth all that trouble... there's more images of people's backs facing towards me then faces that stood still in support of me.

These walls are the very reason why I don't come to you easily... you know that opening my life means in believing you wouldn't be those people who left, and to believe in that takes time.

I apologize now in advance, a thousand times I apologize.

I apologize for mistakes I have made, and the mistakes I will make.

I am a working progress.

I will make you want to pull your hair out, and scream at the top of your lungs for mercy from my stubbornness... you would want to give up a million times and a million times I am sure you will but i beg you, stay.

Stay and see because I am meant for you and you are meant for me.

I may not be perfect but can you really imagine every breathe you take in your life to be away from me?

Stay and see because its a great show we will have... with a great ending.

Stay and see because...you know with out me, there is no you because with out you... there's no me.

Stay and see this caterpillar grow into a butterfly.

Why you ask i'm such a freak for butterfly... it's not just because of that song.

Its people who are willing to believe that an ugly caterpillar can and will turn into a beautiful butterfly are the people who are willing to believe in me, i am ugly and perhaps some times I am too far away from the chance of becoming a butterfly but if only you would believe, if only you will stay and see.. i may just surprise you.

So stay and see, i beg you don't go.

I promise it will be beautiful.

beggars doing ballet

Their bodies are like clothes hanging on a laundry line, wavering in their decisions of where to stand. Some have fallen under the spell of the wind; stretched out abandoned on the floor becoming still images. Some lost in the measures of their own beady eyes in the mirror; “few inches off here and there would be perfect” I could hear them say. Only a few behaved as expected great students to be.

Class began; similar to videotape being fast-forward, suddenly there they are, standing in straight rows of multi colored leg warmer, I had half hoped I had brought my own to blend in.

They seem to look much taller from where I am sitting.

They grip the barre tightly, their faces had changed from ordinary to being a performer of the leading role in “sleeping beauty”, their skin looked as if they could feel the sweet warmth of stage light and standing as if in front of a hall full of audiences. Their first pile exercise: muscles tighten creating the notion of a violin string being played, posture change, elongated arms, projected eye focus; the presence of a dancer had finally arrived.

Arms are waved in cannons; the striking strokes of the feet create dominion effects down the line. You could see on their stern faces from their facial muscle control they longed to break into a smile, each one placed a different smile on their face but surely they are; some with their lips, and some with their eyes each recognizing their poor memory on speedy exercises.

Small giggles of accomplishment or even the chit chatters of mistakes at the end of each exercise had become the trailing instrumental ending to a sad slow song, it seems as if it was composed this way. Beautiful lyrics of instructions conducted the class, you could see, he had compressed his passion of dance in this studio; he demonstrated movements of the inner dancer that still belonged on stage. A teachers’ look of accomplishment was gentle, the praise of excellence was raised although it wasn’t hard to tell his disappointment. His praise spread out the tails of a peacock and his corrections were engraved on their bodies, they gathered up knowledge like a beggar but it wasn’t just knowledge he gave but wisdom covered in gold.

Silence filled the room as he explains Frappe; he finished his performance and in between the momentary pause of breathe he was interrupted with a sneeze, they all waited on his reaction then he giggled with glee of the seriousness of the atmosphere. He announced that their hands reenacted similar features of chickens’ feet and their tight grip of the barre projects a portrait of mechanic dancing machines.

A pause in their timely schedule for stretches on their own.

He danced on his own stage in the corner with silent apologizes of what he wishes and can’t dos’ escapes under his breathe, as his eyes connected with the mirror, he was longing to see a dancer not a teacher. His little moment of pain, like a dancer in the dark with secrets he allows himself a brief moment to accept the reality of injuries then back to pretend, he demonstrates beautifully an adage. He teaches of performance not classroom, he teaches with passion and not movement he understands performing presence and of course, the importance of 5^th position at every ending.

They all stood exactly in the same form, placing each position according to the request and he watches closely “and questions?” but no one ever answers. Some tried but knowing already it’s impossible, some tried for the sake of pleasing and some were determined and some, like pride hanging on a fruit tree, didn’t at all. They chanted the exercises like witches, the spell of “hope”, that with those words it would place a spell on their bodies to accomplish the movements. With his beady eyes, he scans at those whose potential can be pushed, he gave speeches of motivation short but sweet, simple and to the point, and she did it.

They giggled in their tiredness and together with the end of music, their bodies’ collapses loosing all form of the linear body a ballerina composes into a body captured by contemporary dancers.

There isn't much I can place in this tiny little box on my screen

but I hope and pray each day that soon my fingers flow once again the beautiful lyrics of the very best of life God has planned for me.

Psalm 108:4

I'm thanking you, God, out in the streets,
singing your praises in town and country.
The deeper your love, the higher it goes;
every cloud's a flag to your faithfulness.
Soar high in the skies, O God!
Cover the whole earth with your glory!
And for the sake of the one you love so much,
reach down and help me—answer me!