Half of My Heart
Leaving on a Jet Plane
Today is the end. Today is the beginning. Today is the day I’m leaving my home, and everything I’ve ever known to go to America, Pittsburgh to be exact.
My name is Svetlana Vasilyevna Khitrova and I have lived my whole life in Russia. Ever since I was a little girl, my mama groomed and trained me to be a ballerina in the Bolshoi Ballet, like her mama trained her. You see there are two types of people in Russia, the people who barely scrape by to make a meager living and the people who are rich and have more than enough money to spare. Luckily, I was the latter but my ballet training came at a price beyonf the monetary. I was 16 turning 17, when I was accepted to the Bolshoi Ballet Academy, which is late for most girls in Russia, and it was then when I had to leave my first home of Magnitogorsk and I had to leave everything to follow not only my dreams, but the dreams of my parents.
After two years I have risen through the ranks to become one of the top graduates at the Academy. However instead of joining the Bolshoi Ballet or Mariinsky, I chose to join the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre. Naturally I know you must be wondering why Pittsburgh? Its cold, except during the summer where it swelters, and it has one of the highest poverty rates in America. I can give you one reason and the only reason that matters, Evgeni Vladimirovich Malkin. When I left Magnitogorsk I had to leave Evgeni, he was my first, my last and so far my only. When I went to the Academy, we wrote to each other near daily till he left for America to pursue his dream of becoming a professional hockey player. Every performance, every movement at the barre, every moment, even as I sit in this tightly packed airplane, every fiber of my being belongs to him.
Evgeni was my first everything, my first kiss, my first real friend, my first love. Now as I wait for this plane to take off and bring me closer to him I can only hope that he feels the same way.
My name is Svetlana Vasilyevna Khitrova and I have lived my whole life in Russia. Ever since I was a little girl, my mama groomed and trained me to be a ballerina in the Bolshoi Ballet, like her mama trained her. You see there are two types of people in Russia, the people who barely scrape by to make a meager living and the people who are rich and have more than enough money to spare. Luckily, I was the latter but my ballet training came at a price beyonf the monetary. I was 16 turning 17, when I was accepted to the Bolshoi Ballet Academy, which is late for most girls in Russia, and it was then when I had to leave my first home of Magnitogorsk and I had to leave everything to follow not only my dreams, but the dreams of my parents.
After two years I have risen through the ranks to become one of the top graduates at the Academy. However instead of joining the Bolshoi Ballet or Mariinsky, I chose to join the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre. Naturally I know you must be wondering why Pittsburgh? Its cold, except during the summer where it swelters, and it has one of the highest poverty rates in America. I can give you one reason and the only reason that matters, Evgeni Vladimirovich Malkin. When I left Magnitogorsk I had to leave Evgeni, he was my first, my last and so far my only. When I went to the Academy, we wrote to each other near daily till he left for America to pursue his dream of becoming a professional hockey player. Every performance, every movement at the barre, every moment, even as I sit in this tightly packed airplane, every fiber of my being belongs to him.
Evgeni was my first everything, my first kiss, my first real friend, my first love. Now as I wait for this plane to take off and bring me closer to him I can only hope that he feels the same way.
12/9/12