My Best Shot

I left my first love behind in Virginia when my family moved to Georgia. His cocky, belligerent, big-nosed, puka shell necklace-wearing, soccer-playing self was my whole 16-year-old world, and when he broke up with me for another girl I was devastated. (Now they're married, so I think it was meant to be.)

My youngest sister just broke up with hers, and I sat here and tried to think of what to tell her to make it better.

All I came up with was:

1. Stop texting him. Change his name in your phone to something like "Don't Answer." (I think she chose "Selfish.")
2. Your big sisters and your mom have all been through this exact same heartbreak, and we understand.
3. I know in your head he's doing romantic things with another girl, but really he's probably playing video games and imagining you doing naughty things with another guy.

What I really want to say is something about how I don't think you ever love someone that way again, but you're not supposed to -- that first loves are special. Something about leaving yourself open to love in the future and not letting bad boyfriends scar you, about how everyone has sleepless, lonely 3 a.m. thoughts sometimes. But all I could come up with was some reassurance that if she drunk dials her ex one night crying, she won't be the first girl to do so.

And then I promised to take her driving tomorrow.

Shimmy

I started bellydancing to get over a bad breakup. I would have taken any excuse to get out of the house and away from how sad I was. Why not pick something with a coin sash?

I felt stupid even telling anyone I was going to this class. It felt so obvious, like I was trying too hard to be sexy.

But I went. I made awkward arm motions and stumbled over my own feet. I struggled and struggled with the basics that everyone else seemed to understand intuitively. I found it nigh impossible to move both my hands and feet at the same time -- it didn't help that the finger cymbals were hitting a different beat from the rest of me. Everything I was doing was a challenge. I felt like I was using parts of my brain I never had before.

And that right there is the key -- this may be the first time in my life that I've stuck with something I'm not good at. Or even really tried.

I hate making mistakes. I hate not being perfect. Amazing how you can be 24 years old and still figuring these things out about yourself.

I am not a dancer. I'm terribly slow to pick up on choreography and the movements don't come naturally to me. You can probably watch me counting while I forget to smile -- or see me laughing when I'm just so incredibly lost. But when the class was over, I signed up for another one. And then another one. And then another one. And one day in class I finally saw it -- I was getting better. Practicing was making me better.

You could have knocked me over with a feather.

This is what they mean with those million cliches -- practice makes perfect and how it's not about winning and try try again, ad infinitum. It finally finally clicked, all the things that never took hold in my stubborn little brain during basketball or ballet or softball. It hit me in a bellydance studio, while I was doing mayas to Shakira's "Hips Don't Lie." And I just started beaming.