The Dreams I Had

Did you ever love to do something at which you’re no good?  Well, I’ve spent my lifetime as a dabbler in activities in which I wish I was good.  Sadly, I’ve come to accept my lack of shining abilities.

When I was young, from kindergarten, I would say, until seventh grade, my one great desire was to be a musical comedy star.  How I loved those Hollywood musicals, the joy, the romance, the songs!

At some point, I realized I couldn’t sing well.  I can carry a tune, but my range is less than an octave.

I loved coloring books as a child, and one of the outlines I colored was of the Firebird.  This is when I decided I had to be a ballerina.  I think I’ve previously mentioned my chubby thighs?  Many times?  I took dance classes in early grade school, until the teacher Miss Scoville told my mother not to waste her money.  Really?  I wasn’t even eight!

Dreams of dance stayed with me; and, as an adult I took up ballet again, first in Urbana, then in Silver Spring, Maryland, under the excellent direction of Miss Hessler.  I took four classes a week with her.  Two ballet, one tap and finally, when I was forty, toe!!!!!  A lifetime dream was fulfilled. And the best part of it was we performed.  There I was, on stage, in costume.  I forced my sister, who lived about an hour away, to come down and watch me.  Sweet revenge for sharing a room when we were growing up.

Sadly I never found another dance group like the one in Maryland, although I kept trying, until I broke my ankle.

But back to dreams unfulfilled.  I was a baseball fanatic until high school.  The Polo Grounds, Ebbets Field, Yankee Stadium.  I was there.  But I was all too aware at a very young age that I would never shine in athletic endeavors.  Does anyone remember the President’s Fitness Test?  The one I could never pass?  Or climbing ropes in the gym?  Something I never managed.

Okay, I wasn’t great.  But it’s always been my contention that gym teachers are basically evil.  That’s why they pick the best and make them captains.  That’s why I was always chosen next to last when we played team sports.  Then of course there were the divisions of play, A/B/C/D.  Yes, I was D.  Was I really supposed to break a finger in volleyball?

College came.  I loved history.  One time I invited my history professor to the dorm for a meal.  He asked everyone around the table what their grade point average was.  I admitted to a C.  He never looked at me for the rest of the meal.

Then I read a book and decided, damn it, I’m going to be a doctor.  Chemistry lab, very nice guy as a partner.  He wouldn’t let me do a thing because he said he was aiming for medical school.  The implication was that I would mess up all our results.  How true!!!   How I made it through chemistry I’ll never know.  It was basically all math.  But I did master the slide rule.  How many people living today can say that!

Physical anthropology?  Yes, I took a crack at that.  The trouble was there were so many facts to deal with.

I still love everything scientific.  New developments thrill me.  I applaud those who make them.  As for me, yes, I ended up majoring in English because, by the time I followed my dreams, I barely had enough credits in a major to graduate.

Did I ever win the jackpot?  Well, yes.  I married an intriguing individual and we’re nearly at the fifty-nine-year mark.  One of us is still with it.  Plus, I have three equally intriguing children—who have gone their own way, despite my excellent advice.  None dare call it nagging.

So I’ll never star in a musical, dance my way across the stage again, not even play pickleball, but I guess things have turned out all right after all.