When I was growing up, May Day meant just one thing: having
to practice dancing with boys who didn't want to make eye contact, never mind
hold your hand and dance in a complicated pattern around a pole of colored ribbons.
Nicholas, the boy whose name inhabited crudely drawn hearts
on the inside of grocery bags turned book covers, where I swore "2 loved 2
be 4 gotten," was assigned as my May Day buddy. He kept his hand in a fist
the entire time, making me feel I was grasping a sweaty boiled egg. Able to
turn any male disregard to my advantage, I wrote in my journal of his warrior grip
poised for action should another of the boys attempt to not look at me too
closely. I nearly swooned.
I loved May Day, delighted to be given permission to shake my
groove thing during school hours, even if it wasn't to Motown, while having an
excuse to wear flowers in my hair and do giant macramé. The combination of
dancing and good hair mojo is still a winning combo for me. Offer me turning in
a circle and, well, what can I say? You'll have me at hello.
May Day performances are one of the many rituals that have
no relation at all to what life as an adult will be like. For one, there are
not that many places where one can hold a ribbon and dance with your hair in a
bun, outside of the Beijing Olympics. I have a dark pity for the kids I see
now, their eyes glistening, who get their ribbon placement exactly right. I
feel you. This is just one more of those skills they teach us, like how to properly
measure bodies of water, that will come spilling out of our mouths at the
grasping end of a job interview gone horribly wrong. Your adult brain knows you
should bring up your expertise in power point but instead your inner kid grins
and points out emphatically that you were Maypole Queen in both 5th and
6th grades. It sounds way more clever in your head--trust me.
So this is a distress call: May Day! May Day!--which we of many unmarketable skills and useless
knowledge know is from the French word m'aider,
meaning "come help me." I'm seeking comments from all of you out
there who know a little too well what I'm talking about:
What was your favorite thing you learned as a kid that has proved
completely disconnected from a living but which you devoutly wished guaranteed you
an occasional workday (when you are in the mood) and a Kardashian income?
Come on, come help me. I'll be here, practicing my circles.
I spent hours alone tracing Snoopy and the Peanuts gang and inserting my own bubble dialogue above their heads and making my own coffee table books in miniature. I also made my own crossword puzzles and marveled at the tiny swimming creatures spawned from nothing in the rusted lobster pot full of rainwater under the gutter spout. I once sat outside, three stories up, on a steeply pitched roof outside my attic window and felt truly wild and brave. But my favorite thing had to be riding my bike to the top of a hill and letting gravity give me a free ride, gently whispering windy tales in my ears over and over again for hours. I'm sure it's why I love to climb mountains-the excitement of getting to the top, the elation of going down and the view I achieved all by my self, all while feeling rooted to the ground. I also enjoyed spinning in circles. I'll spin with you any time Amy. xo
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