AIDS had a devastating impact on the dance community globally. Lisa Petty was a dancer in New York City during the height of the epidemic. She shares her memories.
I turn over, pillow on head.
Letterman doing his usual shtick. Iran-Contra jokes, guest banter.
The constant, asinine drivel of late night, early morning TV. The drivel was the point. It was his refuge, twenty-four hours a day. Blocking contemplation of what was
and
what may come.
Morning. Lying in bed, numb. Dazed for some time now. Anyone could tell me the most horrendous tales of bad luck or regale me with news of a brilliant achievement and
I
would
not
blink
an
eye.
The phone rings, his mother.
“How is he? Can you see any signs of it dear? Anything I can do?”
What do you think? He’s covered in Kaposi’s Sarcoma. Just last night he had yelped “It’s join the dots time!”
I reply nicely. “Oh, he’s good today. Slept well, still resting. No, I can’t think of anything that you can do”.
How do you answer a foolish question like that? She had scrubbed the walls of her house after we last visited.
I was tired of being nice. Was it a front or was it just easier to be neutral? I couldn’t even articulate my feelings to myself. I hated anyone who asked when I thought he would die. How did they know he would die? Medicine was incredible, they were making great strides all the time.
I prepare for class, pack my bag, feed the cat, wash my face. No need to tidy too much, no-one comes to the house now. Friends long gone. Walking into his bedroom I turn the volume on the TV down a little. He stirs. I kiss him and say “I’d be back later that afternoon”.
I step out of the apartment. The disgusting old man down the hall shuffles about. He smelt bad, his apartment smelt bad. You could smell it as soon as the elevator door opened.
Back inside.
Today I really didn’t want to hear the comments about faggots getting what they deserved.
Silence.
I start out again, hoping that Jamie is not around. That situation was odd. He, the publicly homophobic Puerto Rican superintendent, didn’t judge or run. He said nothing. We both knew he could not acknowledge what was happening. If he did, I would have to find somewhere else to live. He simply looked at me. That look was one of honesty. He knew what was happening. It was as if a mirror was held up to me and I found it unbearable.
I take the elevator down to the basement, unlock my bike, press the button to open the garage door and push my bike past the crack heads who seemed to have settled into the laneway on a permanent basis.
“Hey Lisaaaa, s’uuup?” they screech.
I knew a couple of these guys from restaurants I had worked at. Always playing the same tune, how they suffered, that the world was out to get them. One guy had a wife and three children on Long Island. They never saw him. I struggle to see someone squander their lives while others desperately try to hang on. He was lazy and I had told him so.
“Go home to your family, they need you,” I had said.
He had laughed, “Oh, you don’t understand Lise, you’re a good girl.”
I ride across town repeating my mantra all the way, “Everything is fine, all is good.” New York loved the self-help guru Louise Hay and so did I. I clung to the mantras. I had no idea how to deal with this, no idea how I “should” handle this whole situation.
Yesterday’s news. One of the city’s most respected ballet teachers had jumped from his window. Seventeen stories. He didn’t know how to deal with it either.
Class had changed long ago. Now men covered with KS did the barre and maybe the adagio, but left before they were too conspicuous in the travelling work. I felt ashamed about thinking twice before I spoke to them, about not knowing what to say. I should know, I lived with it.
Last week I had seen Rob downtown. The last man standing from a theatre cast I had worked with. He smiled as he told me he was positive. Again, I was lost for words. We all knew what being “positive” meant. We had all farewelled men who had once told us they were ‘positive”.
Pam, my friend with the superb contralto voice, stopped counting once she had sung at two hundred funerals.
I ride faster; Keith, Neil, Bruce, Michael, Les, hundreds of others. Men who were warm and loving, hardworking, honest and brave.
Of course, there were others who weren’t. Derek for instance. He was a self-involved prick. Totally absorbed in his own image. It killed me to admit it, but that image had been very beautiful. The last I saw him he had lost sixty pounds, a skeleton still trying to work out. Who could believe that a virus could be that powerful? He died alone, never contacting his family down south or having any friends near him. Said he was ashamed of who he was. Derek, prick that he was did not deserve to die alone. No one deserved this.
At the studio. Lock the bike. Upstairs, check my class card.
Finally, in the change room. We are all here. The mid-west conservatives, the liberals, the chorus girls, the principals with the breathtaking artistry, the hobbyists; straight, gay, positive, negative.
I bathe in talk about the “business”, about last night’s date, the best teachers, the whining about oversights at the latest audition.
Into class.
I know this will not change, class will not change. There are rules in the studio, it has structure and the technique is specific.
It is our constant. The structure is our lifeline.
More than performing, in class we know we are here together. Dealing with the same unspoken agony. ln the presence of our bossy, stick-carrying Russian ballet teacher. Today, tomorrow and the day after.
Here, we are transported.
We are home.
Text was produced by Lisa Petty as part of a new initiative of Delving into Dance publishing written content that explores different aspects of dance from a range of perspectives. Edited by Teik-Kim Pok.
This initiative is supported by the Victorian Government through Creative Victoria and the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body. If you enjoy Delving into Dance please consider leaving a contribution. Contribute here.
