Unpublished Snippets from 84 Ribbons -Spam and An Empty Garage

When I cleaned out my files, I found several unused story ideas from 84 Ribbons, book one in my ballet trilogy. Here’s one of them. More to follow this month.

Spam and An Empty Garage

One of the greatest opportunities in my life came when I was four. I learned to dance. My family didn’t have money for extras, but they found a way to scrape enough together for me to take dance lessons. I think those savings came in the shape of canned Spam which we ate once or twice a week. I hated the clear gooey fat that encircled the meat when it oozed from the tin, but it did afford money for me to take lessons so I ate it with ketchup and thought about dancing.

Another way we saved money was by not having a car. The city bus stopped outside our gate so we rode it, walked or got rides from friends or relatives. I may sound like we were poor, but that was not the case. Like most other people along Rhododendron we have much money to spare but we tethered ourselves to happiness by being a close family and neighborhood.

The lack of a car when I was very young allowed me to use the garage to practice my dances. I put on my ballet slippers and pretended my mother’s canning jars were my audience. I twirled and leaped as I made up steps and executed fancy bows. Mom always knew where to find me when she wanted me to set the table for dinner.