Dancing on Tile Floors and Climbing Ladders
chapter piece from my WIP, Grape Flavored Death: and other adult observations
You know
that pinching aching feeling that you get when your calluses bend in at too
sharp an angle? Like when you put your foot down and the skin folds, but it’s
so hard it can’t flex anymore? Funny how the armor you have built up from joyful
pain and sharp rocks creates something that hurts you more.
I was walking through a half-path in
the forest, cringing as my tender skin touched branches and sharp stems, and
rocks so small they stuck to the sweat. Every step my face contorted as I
prepared myself for the sting. “Wow, you need to build up some calluses,” my
friend retorted. She had to turn her head at an awkward angle over her shoulder
because she was so far ahead of me and my feet. I wanted to tell her that last
week I would have been fine. I wanted to paint for her images of peeling skin
revealing pink and contrasting with the unnatural blue of the nail salon’s
pedicure tub. I wanted to tell her that something made me vulnerable, that I
let down my guard and let an Asian woman peel away the past. I wanted to
complain that all my hard work was gone and I shouldn’t have spent the forty
bucks.
But I also wanted to tell her of the
bliss. The teal petals dripping along pale toenails in my prom shoes… I wanted
to say how nice it felt when Maria complemented my color choice. I looked down
at my mud covered feet and saw the remains of peach lingering at the tip of my
big toe. It was chipped and there was dirt edging its way under the paint. I
wanted that color to be vibrant and at the same time I wanted my calluses. I
wanted to enjoy the forest path. But I flinched as a rock that had been
persistently stuck drove deeper into the crevice of my sole.
It’s been
maybe a year since then, and I can touch the bottom of my heel without being
aware of any sensation. The stiff padding is white around the edges where one
thin layer slowly peels, revealing hundreds of dead hard cells beneath it. I
like to go barefoot outside because I know wood chips won’t hurt me and rocks
can bear to scrape a few layers without pain. But sometimes I wish I had a
callus shaver that could pare down a few layers.
I was wearing heels at a dance and
quickly noticed the inconvenience of an extra inches, so I tossed the nude
pumps in a corner. My feet liked to feel the floor below, but it was tile held
in line by lines of mortar. These valleys dip low and pull skin into a ‘u’
shape, small and uncomfortable. For the skin that can mold--that can adapt to
the new experience and accept its beauty-- there is little to no pain. But the
callused feet, built up to withstand the sharp reality outside becomes sharp
itself, scrunching into a stubborn ‘v’. I don’t know when I began to notice it
or if I ever stopped, but the dance kept reminding me of walls instead of
freedom. And I wished I had painted my nails.
Now here I
am climbing ladders into lofted beds, and my feet pinch sometimes. The ‘v’ digs
deep into nerves and into memory, reminding me to buy a callus shaver and some teal nail polish.
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I've been vaguely working on a NanoWrimo project. It's a half personal half fiction piece formatted in a House on Mango Street style. This segment is based off real observations and situations, but not quite true to my perspective.
