It was the evening of my first flamenco class and I gazed up at the clock, watching the final minutes tick past. As soon as the bell rang, I pulled off my name tag and skedaddled down to the ground floor to grab my bag before the hordes of black-suited women descended on the bag check counter.
In my bag I had everything I needed for class. A bottle of water, a long skirt that I’d found at the back of my wardrobe—okay, it wasn’t the red silk creation I’d been lusting after, but it would do for the first class. The one purchase I had made was a pair of black leather dance shoes the teacher had told me to buy before the class. I’d gotten them from a dancewear shop in the arcade across the street from work. I was served by a sixteen-year-old ballerina who had been demonstrating different models of pointe shoes to a young girl who was auditioning for the National Ballet Academy, and there’s nothing that makes me feel clumsier than seeing girls in leotards spinning around on their tippy-toes.
I would have loved to be a ballerina, and I couldn’t help feeling envious and intimidated by the shop assistant as she lazily pirouetted in pointe shoes. Ballet dancers are so über-cool, with their elastic hamstrings and perfect posture, but I couldn’t even touch my toes, and just the word plié made me nervous.
Was flamenco going to be like ballet? Surely not. But it occurred to me that I actually didn’t know anything about flamenco. Well, I knew that it was Spanish and smoldering and I’d heard once that Ava Gardner had danced it on a tabletop with no underwear on, but that was about it. I’d never been much of a dancer. In fact, I’d always had an aversion to physical activity, and the only cardio I did was my daily dash for the bus. Now that I was going off for my first-ever dance class I was afraid. What if it’s too hard? What if I can’t do it? What if I trip on my skirt and fall over and everyone points and laughs at me?
I had to remind myself that I was on a mission from Diana Vreeland, and that there was no time for that kind of debilitating self-doubt. But still, it wouldn’t leave me alone.
• • •
The flamenco studio was located in the bohemian inner west suburb of Newtown, and it seemed to belong there among the African hairdressers, Moroccan and Turkish furniture stores, Chinese bakery, and the only Viking restaurant I’d ever seen.
I took the street down alongside the railway tracks to the old converted grain silo that housed the dance school. Even before I saw the building I heard what sounded like thunder. At first I thought it must be a storm rumbling in the distance, but as I got closer I realized it was the sound of stamping feet.
As I climbed the stairs to the fifth floor, the sound of stamping got louder and louder until it felt like the whole building was shaking. I stepped in through the open doorway of the school. The walls were decorated with black-and-white photographs of a woman in a long sleek dress dancing on stage. In each picture she wore an angry glare on her face. This was the teacher, Diana.
Diana was one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen. She had pale skin and arched eyebrows, like an evil queen from a Disney movie. The evil queens are the best—not like those prissy princesses who are always off singing to the birds. The queens are glamorous and stylish and have personality, because you need personality to pull off a cape.
Standing in reception, I could see through the open doors of the dance studio as the advanced class was ending. There were three lines of dancers, all dressed in black. They twisted their bodies and curled their arms up above their heads, making shapes with their hands as though forming shadow puppets. Then, at a stamp of the teacher’s foot, they let their arms fall and drilled their feet into the floor.
Most of the girls looked Spanish. They had dark hair pulled back tightly and beautiful dark eyes. And as they danced they looked so fierce and passionate, and angry.
Like, really angry.
I’d expected flamenco to be passionate, but these girls actually looked mad. One girl in the front row snarled as she threw herself into the final turn. Wow. I couldn’t wait to get my shoes on and start stamping. After a day of First-Class Service Rule #1—Smile!, it was exactly what I needed.
I tore my eyes away and went into the changing room. It was full of women who’d just come from work, like me. They pulled off suit jackets and loosened their hair, and as they zipped up their long skirts, they flicked the switch from daytime to their flamenco persona.
The sound of clapping came from the studio; it seemed the advanced class was over. The changing room doors opened and the dancers streamed in. They pulled water bottles out of their bags and toweled off their faces and necks.
The girl who had made that spectacular turn stood next to me at the mirror. She put her foot up on the bench and starting unbuckling a pair of forest green dance shoes. They weren’t anything like the ones I’d bought. They were made of thick suede and the sole looked like it was made out of wood. She took one off and put it down on the bench with a heavy clunking sound.
“Where did you get your shoes?” I asked her.
She had long black hair pulled up on top of her head in a tight bun and wore a pair of big hoop earrings that bobbed up and down as she spoke. “These are Gallardos. They’re the best. But you have to order them from Spain. The last pair I bought were made in Japan and one of the heels broke during an escobilla when I was doing the remate.”
I nodded and pretended to understand what she was talking about, while my mind raced. Gallardos? Escobilla? Remate?
I smoothed down my black skirt and stepped out of the changing room, nervous about what was ahead of me. A couple of the advanced girls were still lingering in the studio, going over the footwork and asking each other questions about “the new bit.”
“Is that how you do it?”
“No, the gólpe is on the one.”
“No, it’s on the twelve.”
“I thought it was a contra.”
“No, that’s the tacón.”
Gólpe, contra, tacón? What wonderful words. All the more wonderful because I had absolutely no idea what they meant.
When Diana came back in, they scurried off to get changed. Diana took her position at the front of the room and lifted the hem of her long skirt, revealing beautiful black suede shoes. She picked up one foot and slammed it into the floor, making the mirror tremble.
Whoa.
The next twenty minutes were spent learning variations on stamping: double stamps, triple stamps, jumping stamps, ball-heel stamps. By the end of it my thighs were burning, my hips were aching, and my feet were killing me. If I hadn’t had that glimpse of the advanced class, I wouldn’t have believed that this stamping could bear any resemblance to dance. It felt more like military training. And though Diana assured us that we were building up strength and technique, it was hard to see how what we were doing would one day become a dance.
When Diana gave us a five-minute break, I went to the back of the studio and leaned my elbows on the windowsill, letting the evening breeze cool me down. I could literally feel calluses forming on my feet. If I keep this up, I thought, I’ll never be able to wear sandals again. Sascha would not approve.
As I looked out the window, there was something about the soft evening light on the terra-cotta rooftops that made me feel that I could be in Spain. And just as I thought that, a guitar started to play behind me. It was a run of notes that seemed to chase each other up my spine. I froze and listened for the first time in my life to a flamenco guitar.
I turned around and saw a guitarist sitting in the corner tuning up. He adjusted the bar on his fretboard and played again. I leaned there against the windowsill, completely captivated by the music. I didn’t know then that the song he was playing was called a soleá; all I knew was that I wanted to make this music the soundtrack to my life.
Diana called us back from our break. She stood facing us and lifted her arms above her head in two perfectly curved lines. We followed her movements and circled our arms around our heads, first right, then left, then both arms together.
I saw my reflection in the mirror as I circled my arms above my head. Okay, so my skirt would never make it into the style pages of Vogue. My shoes weren’t those made-in-Spain suede creations the advanced girls wore, and with my red hair and pale skin there was no way I would ever pass for a gypsy chick. But as the long-haired guitarist in the corner played his Spanish guitar, I couldn’t help but feel fabulously exotic.
My shoulders burned and my fingers trembled as Diana coaxed us to stretch our arms out and back and up and around. If she hadn’t been so intimidating, I would have dropped my arms and rubbed my poor aching muscles. But when Diana demonstrated the movements, I was stunned by the beauty of her silhouette. She twirled her wrists and circled her arms like a witch conjuring spirits.
I was so taken by the elegance of her movements that I forgot what I was doing and mixed up my arms. But I didn’t care how bad I looked. I knew I’d practice every day if I could one day be half as good as her. I couldn’t imagine anything more beautiful than to twist and twirl and stamp my feet to the sound of a flamenco guitar. And when your heart wants that, what can you say, but… Well, why don’t you?