Song of Renewal Read Online Free PDF Page B

countertop’s granite surface, echoing Angel’s morale.
    Mama looked indecisive for a moment, then waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, don’t mind me.” She nodded her okay. “Go ahead, honey. This is a special occasion. You do well with your weight, anyway. Not like me when I was your age with ol’ Tarishka calling me Miss Piggy in ballet class!” She crossed her eyes and assumed an awkward, knock-kneed waddling execution, arms at a grotesque angle, eliciting a sudden, rolling belly laugh from Angel.

    “Aw, Mama,” Angel said, gurgling with laughter, “you were never fat.”
    Mama rolled her eyes, then laughed with her and gestured to Angel’s heaping plate. “Have at it, darlin’.”
    Angel tucked into the cake, from which carb comfort, within seconds, swirled through her willowy yet supple body. Why does everything I look at turn to fat?
    She knew what she needed to do. She excused herself to go to the bathroom and quietly, succinctly made herself throw up. There. That would take care of Karinsky’s in-class references to her “chub” and her ballet coach’s snide remarks like, “been laying into the French fries and milk shakes, have we, Angel?”
    The upchucking always left her feeling weak and downtrodden. Unreasonably depressed.
    Needy.
    Angel shuffled despondently to the bar stool, rejoining her mother. “Would you have had me if you hadn’t retired from ballet?“ she asked.
    Mama dropped her dishcloth and moved swiftly to place her hands on Angel’s shoulders and gaze into her eyes. “My darlin’ daughter, you were destined to be. There was never a question in my mind that you were what I wanted in life. ”
    Angel slanted her a searching look. “No regrets?”
    Mama laughed, a joyful, exuberant, celebratory sound. “None whatsoever.” Then she kissed Angel’s tilted nose and returned to her cleanup.
    Angel gazed at her mom at work, awed anew by her strength. She knew of her mom’s difficult childhood, of her being emotionally abandoned by Angel’s sick grandmother, a woman Angel never knew.
    It still warmed Angel to hear her mama’s fervent insistence that she preferred spending her life as a stay-at-home mother. Not many friends of hers could say that. Many of them came
from broken homes and had custody issues. She didn’t know what glue held her folks together, she was just thankful it did.
    Suddenly, Angel’s sugar high crashed, leaving her feeling more morose than ever. “Daddy doesn’t love me anymore,” she proclaimed, believing it in that instant.
    “Don’t ever think that, Angel.”
    Mama moved quickly to give Angel another warm hug. She looked into her daughter’s moist eyes, fingers gently pushing back a stray tendril from Angel’s forehead. “He doesn’t mean to shut you out, honey. He’s just got a lot on his plate right now, several new accounts, which is good, but it takes so much from him. Right at the moment, he has deadlines to meet. Soon, things will even out. Just wait. You’ll see.”
    She kissed Angel’s cheek, gave another snuggly hug, then moved back to the sink and dried the counter. Angel watched her mother move about with a dancer’s lithe grace, looking elegant even doing household chores. Angel gave a little huff and shook her head of shoulder-length wheat-streaked hair. Unlike her, Mama had balletic poise, beautiful muscles, and turned-out legs. Even walking through the mall, Mama couldn’t help it – she stood lifted and tall.
    She retained her distinctive “duck foot,” the turned-out stance of ballerinas, where toes lined up with outer hip bone. Once absorbed, Angel knew that these ballet technique fundamentals remained with dancers for life. At least, with most of them.
    Her mother kept up by cross training with a variety of tools including Pilates, resistance training, and even Yoga. Frequently, Mama joined her in her dance studio upstairs, her coaching providing them time together. Doing stories together to dance and music gave Angel