2008: TWENTY-FOUR YEARS OLD
Every year, after Christmas at my brother Pete’s house with the rest of my mom’s side of the family, my father picked me up and drove me back to my life in Boston. The drive took anywhere from three to five hours. I believe this was a stroke of genius on my father’s part. He knew that if he was given the time, he’d crack me. I’d sit in the passenger seat of his white sedan, fidgeting and biting my fingernails while he asked me questions. We’d speak about books we were reading, real estate, and investments. The fear of saying something stupid made my words sound boxy and rigid.
I remember him saying once, “You know, when you said you’d become a professional dancer, I thought to myself, ‘Sure, whatever.’ But you’ve actually done it!” I knew that was his way of saying, “Holy shit, am I proud of you!”
I began to see Pop in a new light. He became a person instead of the idea of the person I (and my mother) had invented. He spoke to me honestly about his battle with alcoholism and how he didn’t go a day in his life without wanting to light a cigarette. He also said that turning back to alcohol would completely destroy his life. I admired his strength. He confided in me that he would divorce my stepmother when my younger brothers were off at college. I began to question why I had forever feared his judgment. What about a father is so intimidating? Why does it take so long to realize that everyone’s the same shade of shit?
I had long figured out that the math surrounding my mother and father’s marriage and my birth didn’t add up. I had once asked my mother, “Were you and my father together before you divorced Pat?” Naturally, she vehemently denied it. I relate to her very much in this way. Protecting the idea of her was worlds more important than the truth. But on one of these rides back to Boston with my father, I asked, “Did you have an affair with my mother? She denied it, but I don’t think I believe her.”
You should have heard his laughter! A great big roar of mirth. He dabbed his eyes and said, “Yes. We had a very dramatic and scandalous affair. I was your siblings’ swim coach and . . . well . . . there you have it.”
CHAPTER 13
In 2015, Nancy went to see the doctor who performed her immunoglobulin infusions. A routine visit turned into the discovery of lung cancer, which evolved into liver cancer. She began radiation treatments immediately. The chemotherapy made her violently ill. Her hair fell out and she became weak. She hated every moment of this fight. She’d call her children and say, “I’m so tired. I’m just so tired. Do you know how long I’ve been fighting?” And she wasn’t just talking about the cancer.
The doctors bought her time, but it was a terminal diagnosis. James called his father, Stuart, to tell him the news. Stuart then called Nancy and asked if she wanted to talk. She obliged and he drove up to Shelton and they sat and talked for three hours. Stuart’s clothes reeked of smoke so badly afterward that he just threw them out. He began driving Nancy to doctor’s appointments and even drove her sometimes into New York City, where James was now living and working. He’d text James to say, “Your mom is so funny.”
2015: THIRTY-ONE YEARS OLD
After my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer, she wanted to come see me dance one last time. Missy and Heidi arranged to take her into New York City to see me dance the lead in a new ballet called AfterEffect, by Marcelo Gomes. During this ballet I am visited by a spectral, motherly being, played by Misty Copeland. She descends from the heavens into my arms. She does not touch the floor until halfway through the pas de deux. She strokes my hair and comforts me as I writhe in anguish to a swelling Tchaikovsky score. I thought of my mother in the audience, dying of cancer and high on painkillers, and cried into my hands as Misty was carried away from me, into a bright white light. It all felt too on-the-nose to affect me so, but then again, sometimes on-the-nose is just how you feel.
After the performance, my mother came backstage with Missy and Heidi. She was dwarfed by her winter coat and her bare head was covered by a turquoise scarf. Her makeup was layered on heavily, and her too-bright dentures gleamed an impossible white. She could barely speak, she was so heavily medicated. As I danced, I had imagined her effusively rushing backstage, gushing over my performance, and telling me how proud she was. The reality was slow, dull, and gray. She stood, eyes sparkling and unfocused, and wheezed, “Jimbo.” My sister and sister-in-law fed her questions as though she were a child. “Wasn’t it beautiful? Aren’t you proud? Wow! Weren’t the lights lovely?” We posed for a photo together for the sole purpose of having a photo of Mom’s Last Ballet. I smiled widely, more of a grimace really, and felt too much and nothing all at once.
CHAPTER 14
After her diagnosis, Nancy was celebrated and feted. Songs were written for her and meals were made in her honor. She even received a fancy wig that she could wear if she chose. At one party, she donned the wig and began calling herself “Diva.” She then went on to do a five-minute bit about the character she’d spontaneously invented as her children and grandchildren howled with laughter. She wore faux-fur coats and dressed up in her best clothes. She screamed along to Robbie’s songs in proud exultation. She hoisted her leg up to the side, a cigarette dangling from her mouth, to show James that she was still flexible and he got his dancer’s legs from her. She told Pete that he was making “Christmas Breakfast,” a soggy 1950s-style soufflé, better every year. She laughed with Missy about all their private dramas. A mother and a daughter have an incomparable, complex, and beautiful relationship. They made the best of the time they knew would disappear far too soon.
2016: THIRTY-ONE YEARS OLD
Things were really beginning to pick up steam in my career. I had arrived in New York City as an unnecessary invader, but the ballet audiences were warming up to me and I was working like a dog to solidify my place in American Ballet Theatre’s illustrious ranks. I was proud of my hustle and couldn’t believe how much my work was paying off.
My mother had decided she could no longer endure the chemotherapy. She did her last session in the spring. She said she wanted to live a little before she died. To know when you’re going to die must be a strange thing indeed. She was stoic and joyful as she faced death. I think she secretly thought to herself, “Finally.”
My father had been helping my mother with various tasks over the last few months, mainly doctors’ appointments. He happily kept her company as she prattled on about this and that. She asked him if he would take her into the city to see me and he obliged. They drove into the city on a Sunday and we had brunch together in my neighborhood, Murray Hill.
I had never seen my parents together until that day. I had seen them pass each other coldly, but I had never seen them truly communicate. When I was a child and they’d drop me at the other’s house, they wouldn’t even come to the door. There was a wall of thick, immobile ice between them. To find myself sitting at a circular table in Midtown Manhattan with my parents—my actual parents—rocked me. There were no siblings, no stepparents, no new dates, no nothing. I was the sole product of the two adults sitting before me and I had never seen them together.
Nancy was weak of body but sound of mind that day and laughed heartily as they reminisced about their rowdy times in Greenwich. We ate mediocre food and marveled at the Manhattan prices. It was so normal that it made me nauseated. I wanted so desperately to love sitting there with them, but really, I resented how easy it was for them. I wanted to shout, “WHERE THE FUCK WAS THIS MY WHOLE CHILDHOOD?!” But I smiled and sipped my coffee and ate my cold eggs. “That was nice,” I said, as my father helped her into his car and they drove away up Third Avenue.
As American Ballet Theatre’s spring season drew nearer, so did my mother’s imminent death. I felt its presence looming over me in every rehearsal. The guilt I felt for being away from Connecticut and feeling as though I was neglecting my dying mother weighed heavily on every bit of my being. Pete and Missy always bore the brunt of Nancy’s needs—logistical, financial, and emot
ional—while I donned sparkly outfits and fought for applause. I felt the frivolity of my work like never before, and at the same time reveled in it and its ability to shake me out of my self-pity. Art feels like complete nonsense until you realize how much you need it, how it gives you the tools to survive in this world.
I took the train from Grand Central to Bridgeport every Sunday to visit my gravely ill mother. One Sunday, my father picked me up at the station and drove me to my mother’s apartment, where she was receiving hospice care. She was happy to be home instead of wilting in some stark hospital. He dropped me off and told me he’d be back in the late afternoon to pick me up. My older brothers and my sister came over to the apartment and we sat with my mother, who remarked that she didn’t have her teeth in. She was loopy with medications and looked simultaneously happy and like she was crying. Robbie took out his guitar and sang a song he’d written for her called “Chin Up.” She just bobbed her head. She couldn’t understand the weight of the moment. Meanwhile, we five children were beside ourselves with emotion, dabbing our eyes with the most plush toilet paper imaginable. She refused to ever shy away from the most luxurious paper products, regardless of her financial standing. There’s something to be said for that sort of dignity.
Robbie’s song goes like this:
It’s not your fault
It’s not something you’ve done
I know that this doesn’t happen to everyone
But rest assured
You’re gonna be all right
Hold on tight
And keep on fighting till you see the light
So keep your chin up
Because I know that you’ve had enough for today
It’s OK
It’s OK
Another Sunday, my father picked me up from my bedside vigil with my mother. He walked into the back bedroom, where my mother was resting. I was sitting with her, listening to music and reading, when she cracked open her eyes. She took one look at Stuart and reverted to the Stuart-hating Nancy from previous decades. She hissed, “YOU! You asshole! You motherfucking asshole! Get out! Get out! GET OUT!!!!” Struggling against her guard-railed bed, she shouted and swung her emaciated arms in a show of strength that I hadn’t seen in weeks.
Pop’s face fell and his skin grew pale. I could hear the breath catching in his throat. He stood speechless for a moment while she swung at him futilely. The hospice nurse ran into the room and tried to calm her. Her eyes rolled in her head and her lids fluttered. I stood there watching this scene mute and frozen. The last time I had seen them together, she was laughing at his jokes and reminiscing about their time as Connecticut’s number-one rule breakers. I saw the pain it caused my father, who staggered and muttered, “I’ll go.” He shuffled past me while she kept shouting, “Get out! YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE!”
I got into his car. We sat silently for a moment. He kept his eyes cast down and let out a terse breath.
CHAPTER 15
Toward the end, her body became thin beyond recognition and she lost all of her brittle teeth. The cancer had quite possibly invaded her brain. As she lay there dying from cancer of the lungs, she forgot that she ever smoked.
2016: THIRTY-ONE YEARS OLD
I got a message from Pete on the morning of June 29. He said, “It’s time. Get over here.” I was at the theater and getting ready for ballet class and a matinee performance of The Sleeping Beauty. I looked at my phone, looked at the time. I was already putting on my makeup. I texted, “What should I do? I’ve got a performance at two.” And this is the perfect way to sum up my life choices. Any major life experience has been eclipsed by my duty to my art. Not even being summoned by the imminent death of my mother can make me miss a performance. What does that say about me? I looked at my phone and knew I would do the performance. I hated myself every moment of it, but I did it. I didn’t tell anyone about what was going on, because it was easier to hide.
I took my bows for a mediocre performance. I smiled and gestured and collected the requisite rose from my ballerina. I shook hands with the conductor. I turned and smiled at the corps de ballet, who glanced at me with medium interest. The curtain came down and a gap was pulled open for front-of-curtain bows. I led the princess out in front of the majestic gold curtain of the Metropolitan Opera House and we took ceremonious, lengthy bows. The corners of my mouth parted to show my teeth in a strange, monstrous, crooked grin. “What the fuck is wrong with me?” I asked myself. I thought myself a sick person.
We disappeared behind the curtain and my boss and my coaches descended upon me with smiles and a general performance of support. As they approached, I turned to my partner and said, “I’ve got to go. Thank you,” and I ran back to my dressing room in the Principal Hallway. I tore my costume off and scraped my makeup off, dry, with a towel. In a few short moments I was out the stage door and making my way to Grand Central Terminal.
I arrived at dusk. My mother lay semiconscious and unable to speak. She was hooked up to various machines that were clicking and beeping happily. Her nurse hovered over her with deep care in her eyes. Pete, Missy, Robbie, and Andrew were there. We hugged and I apologized for always being last. They laughed at my makeup-smeared face. I knelt next to her and whispered, “I’m here, Ma. I’m sorry I’m late. I love you.”
She held on through the night. I slept at Pete’s and we went over to my mother’s apartment early in the morning. Her whole family was there with her. All five children, their spouses, her exes, her grandchildren. She was stable but slowing down. We sat outside, drinking coffee in the back field, in the cruel late-June sunshine. The nurse leaned out the back door. All she said was, “Come.” We silently mobilized, just us five children, and rushed into our mother’s bedroom.
My brilliant, complicated, unicorn of a mother lay in her sickbed, a mere wisp of her former glory. There was a dark, thick scent in the air. The beeping of her life-support devices mingled with the wheeze of her short breaths. Her peanut head sported the fuzz of a cancer patient who has forsaken treatment. Her mouth lay agape, toothless, and slightly skewed. Her arms were riddled with bruises and scabs. Her skin hung off her bones. That’s what she was: skin spread unceremoniously over muscleless bones. Her hands, which had been a symbol of her grace and strength, were all spots, tendons, and flakes. But it was her eyes that took my breath away. She lay there with her eyes wide open and unblinking. Her beautiful hazel-green eyes were bloodshot and clouded over with a greenish-yellow slime. I looked at her supine body and felt my blood cells raging in mine. I felt the joy and the pain of our thirty-one years together. More than anything, I felt love.
We stood in a horseshoe around her bed and clasped hands, including hers, and formed a ring. We said, “Mom. We’re all here. You can go now, if you want.” Missy said, “No doubt you’ll do whatever you want anyway.” And we all laughed, though hot, fierce tears blazed in our eyes. Even here, faced with death, the children turned to laughter and love. Each of us in turn told her how much we loved her, and how much she had taught us. Life had been relentless for her. It took and took and took and yet she still managed to give us the only thing that truly matters. She gave us our souls. She gave us everything that made us special in a world of people hell-bent on being normal. She taught us to dream. More than that even, she gave us the gift of one another.
She took her last breath and we waited. Her breathing did not resume. We stood hand in hand and cried softly, respectfully. One by one, we filed out of the small bedroom. I was left alone in the room with her. I sat on the edge of the bed and looked around. A corkboard hung on the adjacent wall. I walked over and examined the many things pinned on it, one of which was a rectangular blue plastic name tag that read nancy white, r.n. I plucked it off the board and held it in my nail-bitten fingers. The pin represented so much about my mother. I thought, “This . . . is grit.” I tucked the pin into my pocket and never told my siblings that I had taken it. I don’t
know why.
I went back to the still form of my mother and gently kissed her on the top of her head. I whispered, “Thank you, and I’m sorry.”
HOW I MET JESUS CHRIST ON GRINDR
How did you start dancing?” This is the number-one question that strangers ask me.
I always want to ask them in return, “How did you start bleaching your anus?” or “How did you start curling at the Olympic level?”
The truth of the matter is that my answer to that common question is rather commonplace, although I wish it were more exciting. Do you ever wish you could zhuzh up your life? What sort of tales would you spin? Maybe you would be a chihuahua breeder from Chattanooga named Chooch, or perhaps your mother would be the inventor of meth. In the spirit of the immortal wisdom of the Spice Girls in “Spice Up Your Life,” here are my many paths to dancing—including the real story.
MARTHA STEWART
“How did you start dancing?” the plastic surgeon asked.
“Well,” I replied, “when I was nine years old, Martha Stewart’s car broke down in front of my mother’s house on Christmas Eve. It was raining cats and dogs out there and she used a Hustler magazine to shield her face from the rain as she skipped up to our front door. I saw her coming and opened the door and shouted, ‘Come on in! It’s better than prison!’
“We made ourselves extra-dirty martinis and had a sock hop, just the two of us, listening to the Temptations and the Supremes on vinyl. She had this one great move in which she’d spin as fast as she could, holding her full martini glass in her hand. She spun so fast that she was able to turn her glass completely sideways without spilling a drop of her martini. When Martha stopped, she said, ‘Now that’s centrifugal force.’ To which I replied, in my prepubescent falsetto, ‘No, Martha, that’s centrifugal fierce.’
Center Center Page 8