Once Upon an Opening Night...
"But now the looking-glass caused more unhappiness than ever, for some of the fragments were not so large as a grain of sand, and they flew about the world into every country. When one of these in atoms flew into a person's eye, it stuck there unknown to him, and from that moment, he saw everything through a distorted medium, or could only see only the worst side of what he looked at, for even the smallest fragment retained the same power which had belonged to the whole mirror. Some few persons even got a fragment of the looking glass in their hearts, and this was very terribly, for their hearts became cold like a lump of ice. A few of the pieces were so large that they could be used as window-panes; it would have been a sad thing to look at our friends through them. Other pieces were made into spectacles; this was dreadful for those who wore them, for they could see nothing either rightly or justly."
What was it about mirrors in fairy tales"
"My brother has gone blind." Josette murmured softly to her own reflection in the mirror in the quiet of her dressing room, after the call of half hour before curtain.
Transformed into Gerda with flowers and ribbon woven artfully in her hair, her costume that of a lovely peasant girl, she clasped her hands together and began her breathing exercises which became a common ritual once upon a time in Paris.
Isaac had not spoken to Josette in weeks after their explosive argument when she finally told him she would be starting rehearsals for the ballet and the ticket she left for him at the box office went unclaimed as far as she knew when she last checked for perhaps the fifth time before she had to begin warming up.
For Josette's return to the stage, she could not have imagined that the role would strike so eerily close to home. Fingers ran lovingly over the pages of the well-worn book of Hans Christian Andersen's Fairy Tales on her dressing room table. The story of The Snow Queen marked in certain passages that she had read over and over.
"In one of these large towns, lived two poor children who had a garden something larger and better than a few flower-pots. They were not brother and sister, but they loved each other almost as much as if they had been."
Though the ballet version was quite different in certain respects, there were all too many parallels and chords of the original story that struck home and resonated deep within her. She wondered how many others looked through a distorted mirror or lens and could no longer see the beauty around them or even their true selves. Isaac had changed so much since their childhood, that she feared he only saw the worst aspects of humanity and had lost all sense of his true self and his own gifts which he buried long ago. His fears about her illness and loss had manifested into an obsessive need to control and when Josette stood her ground when he told her she would not be staying with the ballet, the rift between them appeared to be almost irreparable.
"And then just as the clock in the church tower truck twelve, Kay said, 'Oh, something has struck my heart!" and soon after, 'There is something in my eye.' Poor Kay had received a small grain in his heart, which quickly turned to a lump of ice. "
When her head hit the pillow after those long rehearsals, Josette dreamt of roses. Some nights the velvet soft petals fell like so many snowflakes and touched her cheeks in an endless cascade of soft caresses. On other nights, there were galaxies of roses with interconnected vines like patterns of constellations that shone brilliantly in the darkness and whispered words of encouragement and hope to her.
But each night the end of the dream was the same with a maze of endless mirrors like the fun house at the carnival that distorted all of her perceptions, and blinded her to the way out. No matter how hard she fought to take command of the dream, it always got away from her and she was lost, endlessly looking for Isaac around every corner. Each time she thought she got close enough to touch his hand, all the mirrors would shatter and the fragments cut deep into her skin like a million tiny blades and she would wake in a cold sweat with a metallic taste in her mouth.
Despite the restless nights, she had worked so hard over the past few weeks and trained tirelessly with the ballet mistress, Irina, to get her to where she needed to be. Being new to the company and aware that they were taking a chance on her, she took nothing for granted and often stayed late to make sure she had captured the unique language of the choreography to convey the very essence of Gerda's emotion in each scene.
New dance partners could be tricky if not paired well, so Josette was so relieved to find that she felt extremely safe with Jamie who had been very supportive and a consummate professional. He proved to be such an extraordinary dance partner that challenged her in the best of ways to excel.
Josette's episodes gradually diminished over the course of a few weeks and the tremors were blessedly non-existent when she was dancing. The role of Gerda held a strength that infused itself into Josie's very cells and breathed new life into her over the past few weeks. She was the heroine of this story and refreshingly, was the one that did the rescuing in this tale instead of being the damsel needing to be saved.
At the call of five minutes over the intercom, Josette rose to go and watch the opening from backstage and do some final stretches. She very much enjoyed seeing Maggie and Doran perform as the young Gerda and Kay in the first Act, as well as Merethyl's other-wordly entrance as the Snow Queen which was an exquisite sight to witness. Anthony had done a spectacular job with the choreography and the orchestra was second to none, which all lent itself to visual and auditory delight for the audience.
Quiet murmurs of "Merde" (an amusing tradition in Paris for wishes of a successful performance) were spoken to her fellow dancers as she passed each of them backstage as well as countless coos and croons for Anya and Anthony's little daughter Sofia, who proved to be a delightful addition of pure joy in the Green Room.
The excitement was palpable as she passed through a veritable blizzard of excited Snowflakes from The Shanachie STARS Program in their lovely costumes that sparkled like millions of tiny icicles amidst lovely layers of tulle.
As the orchestra tuned their instruments, Josette drew in a deep breath and felt a familiar thrill along her spine as the music finally began. She was told by nearly every doctor and specialist in the earth realm that she would never dance again. Yet here she was about to take the stage again in Rhy'Din for the first time in years since the worst of her illness. She refused to let the diagnosis limit her, or let the shackles of the words of others, no matter how well meaning, keep her from what she loved any longer.
This was a new beginning for her in Rhy'din. Dancing was Josette's greatest joy in this life and without it, she knew she would wither like one of Gerda's beloved roses. She would be forever be grateful for this moment. Even though the seat she'd counted on being filled was probably empty out there in the audience, her heart swelled with gratitude as she murmured a quiet whisper of thanks to whatever powers that be in the cosmos that supported her that might be listening.
When it came time to step out on stage, Josette poured all of the emotion she held within into her dance and let it infuse every arch and extension of her body until the translation of Gerda's brave journey was as seamless in her delicate frame as it was in the unfolding on the pages of Anderson's Fairy Tale.
"But can you not give little Gerda something to help her conquer this power?"
"I can give her no greater power than she has already," said the woman; 'don't you see how strong that is? How men and animals are obliged to serve her, and how well she has got through the world, barefooted as she is. She cannot receive any power from me greater than she now has, which consists in her own purity and innocence of heart. If she cannot herself obtain access to the Snow Queen, and remove the glass fragments from little Kay, we can do nothing to help her."
(*Sections in bold are excerpts from Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen)