Susan Senator

I’m sending Nat to an Imax movie with his Northeastern buddy. I hope it goes okay. I don’t know if Nat has ever experienced Imax. This anxiety reminds me of the time we all went to the Atlantis on a January getaway, and the first time we all went down the giant tube slide. I don’t know why, but Ned and I did not go with Nat, on his tube. I went ahead of Nat, and then I think Max was behind him. When I shot out of the tube, I suddenly realized that Nat might be completely terrified and uncertain in that long tunnel, and he might panic. I had no idea, all of a sudden, what he would do. Would he scramble out of the tube, and drown? Would he somehow get stuck somewhere? How would we know, how would we find him? Why, oh why, did we send him alone down the tunnel slide?

And then, of course, Nat came shooting out, huge smile on his face, ready to go again. Just as Nat stores up a repertoire of experiences to draw upon and to understand the world around him, I build up a store of Nat-experiences to figure out whether he can handle whichever new even comes up. I learn over and over again that he is just a kid, a person with the ability to make certain leaps and conclusions, and also one who can see to his own calming and needs.

So today, it is Imax. I figure he won’t get nauseated, the way I did when I went with Ben’s class. But I think that rather than being too fresh and new, this happened because I am now getting old! I used to laugh at my mother when she could not take even the simplest amusement park ride. I thought she was kidding! But it was absolutely real. We just can’t take the Gs or whatever it is.

I am wondering, too, if this sensitivity will forever be in the way of my spinning. I keep practicing spins, because to me, that is one of the signature bellydance moves, when you want to go fast. You want to appear to be lost within the spin, head down, hair fanning outwards. But you also need to “spot,” to fix your eyes on one place in the room and keep returning them to it as you make your turn. This only helps mildly with the dizziness. I have also heard that some girls shut their eyes when they spin, which I have done successfully, but only for one or two spins (before you crash into something). One or two spins is not enough for the effect, anyway.

The little kids (Baby Bellies) simply spin and get dizzy, (unless I pin a sock to the fall and they spot with that) but the dizziness makes them laugh. Why is it so unpleasant a feeling to me, but so pleasurable to a child? What happened to me? And where, in this particular spectrum, is Nat?

Perhaps you have to view the dizziness in G Gordon Liddy terms, when he thrust his hand into a flame: The trick is not minding.