[NOTE: This is a reprint of a previous post. I came across it the other day and I happen to like it.]

I saw her walking ahead of me on a sidewalk in New York, and I knew immediately.

She had the long hair, slicked back into a slightly damp ponytail. The large soft bag, slung over the shoulder. The small stature and the narrow slimness. The straight spine and the long, erect neck. The impression that a plumb line had been dropped from the middle of the top of her head straight down through her torso and solar plexus, from which her body was somehow regally and calmly suspended.

And underneath it all, the feet. Larger than one might think would be the underpinnings of this otherwise diminutive person, with toes facing outwards at a sharp angle. Her feet would have made her walk seem awkward and ducklike were it not for the style and grace of the rest of her stride.

No doubt about it: she was a dancer. Ballet dancer, most likely. New York is highly populated with them. I know the contents of her large shoulder bag, too: sopping wet leotards and tights, several pairs of shoes, lambs’ wool and tape and bunion pads, a towel to wipe off the sweat, hairpins galore, and an assortment of plastic and woolen leg and body warmers to induce even more sweat and the loss of the last few ounces of fat that might still cling to that pared-down body.

Maybe a yogurt. A bottle of water. Some lettuce leaves in a small plastic container.

And an iron will, a soaring ambition, a denial of the odds, and a love of the thing itself: the sheer pleasure of forcing the body into attempting mastery of something very difficult, very beautiful, and very satisfying.