I think even when I'm asleep...

I had this dream in May of 2010, but it applies just as much today...

Last night I had a ballet dream. Even though I pretend to be a ballerina whenever I put on my temple shoes, I've never dreamed in ballet before so that was fun. In spite of the somewhat depressing content, I never realized I was so creative.

The scene opens with a ballerina dressed in make-shift armor. None of it really matches, and it most definitely wasn't made for her. The chest plate is gold and shiny, and the other pieces of metal are all different colors. She also has a sword that she's not very good at using. The armor makes her clumsy.

Onto the stage comes a boy. They dance around each other for a while, and there is some obvious interest which is exchanged in a playful way. There are no lifts or anything like that, they dance around each other and near each other, but it's not a "oh, we're in love" dance. She is feisty and fun. He decides to take her on an outing to the carnival.

Throughout the carnival scene she puts down pieces of her armor. They go to a booth where you throw a ball at bottles, she puts down her sword and doesn't pick it back up. They get food and she has to take off her helmet to eat. They go to the ferris wheel, and she has to take off more armor because she won't fit into the chair with him and the armor. As the armor comes off, her dancing is more graceful and she is obviously more flirtatious but also more vulnerable. At the end of the carnival, she is completely free of armor and can dance gracefully and frolic with the boy. She is just in a pink wrap around practice skirt, not a tutu.. At the end of the carnival, he's very flirty too and she tries to engage him in a 'we are in love' dance, but he's having none of it. They obviously care for each other in a friendly way, but there are still no lifts and spins. She decides to give him her heart, but he won't take the whole thing. He wants them to be just friends, so they exchange halves of their hearts like those best friend necklaces.

Then the prima ballerina toe-shoes onto the scene. She is in a pink way sticky-outy tutu and she has on pink sparkly armor that was made just for her. Her helmet has a tiara attached, and the armor is all diamond studded. She looks preen, proper and impenetrable. Her sword is even snazzy and dainty. She gets the boys attention completely.

The girl notices the attention switch and fights to get him back, but there is nothing she can do about it. He is mesmerized by the prima ballerina. She is not really interested in him, but she is interested in collecting him. She makes him lift and spin her and he does everything she wants. For the boy, his dance with the prima ballerina is a 'we are in love' dance, but for the prima ballerina it's more of a 'I got what I wanted again' dance. The other girl dances around with increasing franticness trying to recapture his attention. Nothing works, and he leaves the stage to get something for prima ballerina. Once he is gone, the prima ballerina turns her attention to the armorless girl, and attacks her. There is a fight, the girl without any armor or protector loses.

The prima ballerina leaves and the boy returns and the girl tries to tell her story, but he doesn't believe her. There's no way the prima ballerina could ever act like that because she's so beautiful, well dressed and proper. The prima ballerina returns and he gives his whole heart, which is really half of the girls heart and half his. Then he leaves again to go get something for the prima ballerina. The prima ballerina takes the heart, and tears off the girls part, crumples it, and discards it. Then she leaves and the girl picks up her crumpled heart piece and tries to smooth it out.

When the boy returns to the stage, he has changed significantly. He is dressed in armor, and acts like a tin man. The prima ballerina is pulling the strings, and he is sent to fight the girl and get back the other half of his heart. The armorless girl fights to get her friend back, she runs to the carnival, trying to remind him of the good times they had. He takes swings at her, but without all the armor she is free-er to move and dodge the strikes. She takes a few hits, but none of them are too serious. In the battle, a piece of his armor falls off. 

Eventually she runs into the prima ballerina who tells her to give back the half of the heart she is keeping. Resigned to loss, she hands it to the boy without any more argument because it is obviously what he thinks will make him happy. He immediately hands it over to the prima ballerina who reconnects it with the other half and then puts it away in a box with other hearts she has collected, and never gives him anything in return.

The prima ballerina gets a victory dance with the boy and then they leave the stage. In the background, the girl is sadly dancing around, collecting her old mis-fit pieces of armor and putting them into a pile. She is obviously crying. She picks up the last piece as the victorious prima ballerina and boy leave the stage. The last piece is the piece of his armor that fell off the boy in their battle. That is the first piece of armor that she puts on this time, and then all the others are put back on, one at a time and her dancing goes back to clumsy and lacking in grace.

The interesting thing is that the prima ballerina has the same number of hearts as the girl has pieces of armor.