The Sugarless Plum: A Memoir (2 page)

Jerry has an animal-like sixth sense. He can smell fear, and even if he likes you, your fear can drive him crazy or drive him away. He's remote, grand, known to be cruel. And he's known for his temper. I want him to see me dance. I want him to love me. I want him to ask me to dance
Goldberg
again.

Onstage, Peter finishes his solo with a flourish. Backstage, we hear the explosive applause. It trails off. Now it's my turn to dance. I run onto the stage and stand in fifth position. I watch the conductor. His hand goes up, then comes down. The music starts and I begin. I sail around on my toe. I don't fall off. Amazing. It's as if all the years of training have been preparing me for this single moment.

After one revolution, I slow my momentum to a full stop. Still on pointe, I balance on my left toe while my right leg extends to the side. Then I bend my left knee, as my right leg bends and comes to rest behind my ankle in the position called
coupe.
I have never done it so perfectly. “Don't relax yet, you have to do it one more time,” I tell myself. The second turn goes just as well. Now I am free to dance my heart out.

I chassé and bourrée all over the stage. It's as if I'm skipping through a meadow on a sunny day. Jerry has to see my talent. He has to love me again. Still, while Jerry chose me for my dancing, I realize that something else drew him, as well. After all, everyone at City Ballet can dance. Everyone is special. Everyone sparkles.
But what Jerry saw in me was an extra sparkle. Maybe it's not possible to shine when your body is struggling as mine is.

Have I lost my sparkle in his eyes?

 

At the end of my solo I have a series of turns on the diagonal. I'm supposed to end up right at the wing where Jerry's standing. I run across the stage. Just as I begin turning toward him, I see him walking away while I'm still dancing. I'm performing for more than two thousand people, but the only one I can think of is Jerry. I'm smiling for the audience, but my heart is sinking.

I try not to think about Jerry as I take my curtain call with the rest of the cast to enthusiastic applause.

An hour later, the stage is bare, the audience has long since gone home, and I'm leaving the theater with Romy, cradling a bouquet of roses from Peter Martins. As we're walking out, I notice a message tacked to the bulletin board: “Zippora, urgent. Call your doctor.”

I know I should call her, and I promise myself that I will—just as soon as the season is over, which is in just three weeks. I get through the remaining five performances of
Les Petits Riens on
sheer strength of will. But a few days later I receive an unexpected wake-up call in the form of a dream.

I've always believed in the significance of dreams, and this one is particularly frightening. I dream that I'm in a car. The car isn't moving and the windows and the doors are open, but the engine is running. Suddenly, the windows roll up and the doors lock shut. Then the fumes from the exhaust start coming through the
vents in the dashboard and filling the car. I can't breathe and I can't get out. I wake up just before I suffocate.

As I lie there, trying to catch my breath, the dream seems to me like a portent. The car is my body and the exhaust is something happening inside me that is life-threatening. I realize that something is not right.

 

That afternoon I phone the doctor during a five-minute rehearsal break, and she tells me I have to come in immediately. A few hours later, I'm in her waiting room. It's cold and sterile. It gives me the creeps. It's six-twenty and I've been waiting for an hour. To get there, I had to skip my final rehearsal of the day for a ballet I was scheduled to dance the following week. Now I have to get back to the theater by seven-thirty to put on my makeup and get ready for this evening's performance. I don't have time to sit here, but I need to know what's so urgent and she wouldn't tell me over the phone.

Finally, the door to her office opens. She invites me in. She's a tall, thin, attractive woman in a tailored white doctor's coat. She's smiling, but I see pity in that smile and it puts me on edge. She looks as if she's about to tell me she ran over my dog. She studies my chart for a moment, then tells me that my blood sugar levels are 350. Normal levels, she says, are 120 or under. I ask what this means. She says it means that I have diabetes.

Diabetes? I've heard of it. It's one of those charity diseases, the kind they raise money for. She hands me four pamphlets that describe what may happen to me: heart disease, stroke, blindness, kidney failure, foot and/or leg amputations.

I can't take it in. I refuse to take it in. Instead, I try to figure out how long it will take me to get back to the theater. If I get out of here soon I can make it. Even if I don't get a cab, I can walk it in twenty minutes.

She says we can discuss a treatment plan during our next appointment. Another appointment? Why can't we discuss it now? I want to know what to do. I want everything to go back to being the way it was. But all she will say is that she doesn't want me to feel deprived of food; that feeling deprived could cause me to go overboard eating the wrong thing. She says it's not okay to eat a whole cake—as if I don't know that—but it's all right to have a little piece of cake. What is she talking about? I'm a dancer. I'm disciplined. I wouldn't eat a bite of cake if I'm not supposed to. Anyway, I don't eat cake. Period.

I hate this doctor. She's talking to me as if I'm a child or an idiot or both. I don't trust her. She has no idea whom she's dealing with. She doesn't know me. I'm in her office no more than fifteen minutes, and I'm so turned off by her condescending attitude that I don't even bother to make another appointment.

Finally, I get back to the theater. Now I can focus on the ballet I'm dancing tonight, Balanchine's
Piano Concerto No. 2.
For dancers in the corps it's one of the most demanding ballets. Even the strongest corps dancers have problems getting through it.

The section that worries me most comes in the third movement. It's tired me so much in rehearsal that I've wanted to run off stage and fall to the ground in an exhausted heap. Instead, I have to execute one of the most difficult and controlled se
quences of steps. How I am going to manage it, especially now? Losing limbs…. going blind…I hate that doctor's voice. I want it out of my head.

As terrified as I am to dance tonight, I need the stage right now. Onstage, I feel alive. I feel safe. What happens onstage isn't real, of course, but it's where I can enact, experience and connect to the grandest human emotions, from exultation to despair. In that sense, being onstage often feels more real and immediate than life.

There are just twenty minutes until the performance, and I have to warm up my muscles. But the more I try to get warm, the colder and clammier I feel. Backstage, I put resin on the heels of my tights and the heels of my pointe shoes so they won't slip off. Next to the resin box there's a big bucket of water. I've dipped my heels in this water hundreds of times to keep my shoes from coming off. Now I can't. The water's too cold. I'm too cold.

I've got to calm down.

I sit in a corner and, as dancers do before a performance, take a few minutes to sew my toe shoe ribbons together so they don't unravel. The wardrobe mistress helps me hook up my costume. I look in the mirror to make sure the picture is complete: costume, shoes, hair, makeup.

“Dancers, the call is onstage,” says the stage manager, his voice booming through the loudspeaker. Oh, no. I have to pee! How is this possible? I went to the bathroom less than half an hour ago. But I have to go again. And I really have to, because when you need to pee there's no way you can dance for thirty-five minutes.

I have just a few minutes until the overture starts. I race to the bathroom closest to the stage followed by the wardrobe lady, who has to unhook my entire costume and then hook it all back up again.

Thank God the overture for Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 2 is long. The orchestra will play for several minutes before the curtain is raised. I'm back onstage, going over the sequence that has me so worried. I do it over and over, reminding myself to hold my stomach tight. The overture becomes louder, stronger, fiercer.

Three more minutes until the curtain goes up. I take my place. I love dancing to Tchaikovsky's music. It's passionate and bold. It always awakens my deepest feelings.

Suddenly, I begin to shake. To my horror, I start to cry. I try to stop, but I can't. I hate public displays of emotion. I don't cry easily, but I can't help crying now. One of the male dancers hurries over and puts his arm around me. He asks what's wrong. I'm sobbing uncontrollably as other dancers gather around me. I have to pull myself together. I need to lighten the tension. “It's a good thing my makeup is waterproof,” I say. The others exchange looks.

I know what they're thinking, “Why is she freaking out?”

I wipe my cheeks and pinch my false lashes to be sure they've weathered the storm. The curtain rises. The ballet begins with a line of eight corps de ballet women positioned in a diagonal line facing the audience. We wear blue costumes with flowing chiffon skirts and sparkles across the neckline. Facing us are eight corps de ballet men. Their backs are slightly to the audience. The music becomes gentle and soft. The men walk toward the ladies.
The dancing begins. Tears flow down my cheeks throughout the entire performance.

As I dance, my mind is racing…losing limbs, kidney failure, heart disease, stroke, going blind.

I just need rest, I tell myself, and my blood sugar levels will go back to normal. The long winter season has been too demanding. It'll be over in two weeks. Then I'll have three weeks to recover before the spring season begins. Anyway, I'll bet the diagnosis is just a lab error. There's no way I can have diabetes. I'm a twenty-one-year-old dancer with the New York City Ballet. Things like that don't happen to people like me.

Although I'm still determined to get through the end of the season, once I receive my diagnosis it becomes harder to ignore the physical symptoms that have been plaguing me for so long. I'm constantly licking my lips, which are painfully dry. No matter how much water I drink, I'm always thirsty. I can't wind down, and I'm barely sleeping, which is probably why I'm spacey all the time.

But at nine-thirty the morning after my doctor visit and my onstage meltdown, I have to ignore how I feel and get myself to company class as I do every day. No matter how accomplished a dancer becomes, we never stop taking class, and we're expected to be there on time. As I hurry down the hallway, I hear piano music in the distance. Class has begun. This is the first time I've ever been late.

I sneak in between two dancers at the front barre. Holding the barre with my left hand, I join in the morning ritual. It begins with pliés: in a plié you bend your legs, slowly lowering yourself nearly to the floor, and then rise up again while keeping your
back straight and your knees over your toes, which ensures a turned-out position. We practice pliés using four of the five positions of the feet in ballet. There's also a third position, but it's never used; in fact, Balanchine hated third position. He thought it was ugly.

I look at Suzanne Farrell at the barre across from me. The best-known Balanchine ballerina of her time, she was also his greatest muse.

Suzanne is my favorite ballerina. Today she is serene as always, wearing her signature Spanish-style shawl, which is brilliantly colored in deep blue, red, green and orange. She wears the shawl wrapped and tied at her breastbone; it flows with every motion of her body.

I've always been flattered that Suzanne seems to notice me. Now, in class, I pray she doesn't look my way. When barre ends, I rush to the bathroom. In the six hours of rehearsals that follow, I'll be in and out of that bathroom again and again. Somehow I make it through the day. The toughest part will be getting through this evening's performance.

I can't let myself think about how bad I feel. I have to keep pushing. Before putting on my makeup, I wait in line to see the physical therapist, hoping to gain some relief from the piercing pain in my muscles. A dancer's muscles are always sore, but the pain that I am experiencing has become excruciating and I have no idea why.

The physical therapy room is small, a space maybe ten-by-ten feet that houses a physical therapist, a massage therapist,
two massage tables and machines for ultrasound and electrical stimulation. The therapists are available three hours before each performance. They're needed because every dancer is always in some kind of pain: a torn calf muscle, a back in spasm, a recovering foot fracture, an arthritic hip. We all dance injured, and we all operate on the assumption that if we can walk, we can dance.

In the therapy room, I avoid making eye contact with the other dancers. When I'm trying to stay calm, I've always found that it's best to keep to myself. Now one of the women in the corps approaches me and rests her hand on my shoulder. “I know what you're going through,” she says. “I have an uncle who has diabetes.”

Everyone in the room looks up. Then they look at me. My face turns red with rage. I want to scream. I want to slap her.

How could she know? I haven't told anybody. Not even my own sister.

“I saw the same doctor yesterday,” the dancer continues, anticipating my question. “She mentioned it to me.”

I shoot her a look that says, “Not one more word or it's a fist in your face.”

Then it hits me: Everyone in the company sees that doctor. And she's talking about me. I feel betrayed, helpless. How dare she say anything about me to anybody?

Oh, well, I tell myself. So what? It doesn't matter. I'm going to prove that stupid doctor is wrong, anyway. I don't have diabetes. I just need to rest.

I run to the bathroom again.

 

Three hours later I'm onstage performing. My legs are shaking so much I'm afraid they're going to give out on me. I can't feel my toes. I'm cold and clammy and falling off pointe on every step. I'm dizzy. I feel like I'm going to pass out.

I have to pull it together. I can't fail, especially not in front of Peter Martins. Even though I danced well in
Les Petits Riens,
a dancer's career is all about consistency. If Peter doesn't feel that he can depend on me, he'll never let me dance a leading role again. I hear the doctor's voice in my head again, “You have a disease called diabetes.” I have to banish that voice. I focus on the dancing as hard as I can.

When I'm finally walking down the hallway to my apartment that night, I sigh with relief. Not a moment later I feel like I'm going to faint. The dizziness, the hunger, the urination, the sores, the thirst—the more I try to push, the more I'm falling apart. I lie in bed staring at the ceiling.

There are just two weeks to go in the season now, but I don't think I can make it. I've had physical problems before, numerous foot and ankle injuries, but I could always push through them. In fact, I'd had a broken fourth metatarsal in my foot when I danced a lead in one of Balanchine's ballets that inspired him when I was just a student to be interested in me for the company. My doctor couldn't believe I was walking, let alone dancing.

Why is it different now? Why can't I hold on? My usual reserve of determination is gone, replaced by constant brain fog. And
for the first time I have to admit that maybe there really is something wrong with me.

I almost pass out again as I get up to go to the bathroom. Looking at my pale reflection in the mirror, so different from the one I presented onstage just hours before, I finally face the fact that I'm not well. I cannot continue dancing.

Before company class the next morning, I go over to Rosemary Dunleavy, the main ballet mistress for members of the corps de ballet and the person who has the power to determine which corps members will dance what and when. She was once a City Ballet corps dancer herself, although she doesn't look much like a ballerina: She's five foot four with hair so short she never needs a bun. She wears baggy sweats and a large knit sweater that hangs halfway down her thighs. She never lets anyone see her body, even though she's thinner than most dancers. I know this because she changes her clothes in the same bathroom on the fifth floor that I'm always using these days.

Rosemary is the only ballet mistress who takes class with us. During the rehearsal day, when she teaches us choreography, she wears her pointe shoes and demonstrates the steps as if she were performing onstage. Class is as important to her as it is to me. As a young company member I spend most of my day in the studio with her. She's yet another extremely important person whom I very much want to like me.

I'm terrified now as I kneel at her side while she lies on the floor, stretching her leg over her head. “I'm not feeling well,” I say. “I don't think I can perform right now.”

Rosemary's owl-like eyes get bigger. “What's wrong? Are you okay?”

What do I say? If you pull out the day of a performance, you'd better have a great reason, a big one. I have a big one, but I also don't want her to think I have a problem. I can't let
myself think
I have a problem. “I just found out that I have diabetes. I need to learn what to do for it. I think I should go home for a while.” I can't believe I've actually said that. Going home is the right thing to do, but it hadn't crossed my mind until the words were out of my mouth.

Only now does it strike me that this is a pivotal moment in my life.

Rosemary stares at me as her mind races to figure out what ballets are going to be performed that evening and what parts I have in them. “What about
Coppelia?
” she asks. “Can't you do it?” I'm supposed to dance as one of Coppelia's friends that night. It's a great part, with dancing in all three acts, and I love it.

I desperately want to say “Yes, I can do it.” Instead I say, “I'm sorry, I just can't.” Rosemary looks away. I'm already out of her mind. She's moved on to deciding which dancer will replace me. I pick up my dance bag and leave the studio.

Right now, only two things matter:

I've got to get some help.

I've got to get out of there.