{"id":1765,"date":"2015-02-10T11:24:32","date_gmt":"2015-02-10T01:24:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/?p=1765"},"modified":"2015-02-10T11:24:32","modified_gmt":"2015-02-10T01:24:32","slug":"fifty-one-red","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/?p=1765","title":{"rendered":"fifty-one (red)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Ashley Ellis. Principal Dancer of Boston Ballet. Photograph by Ken Browar and Deborah Ory, of\u00a0NYC Dance Project<\/a>. June, 2014.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Over the weeks\u00a0leading up to my mother’s death, I went out into the orchard\u00a0each night\u00a0and trained myself to see in the dark. This was at her insistence. A training I at first refused.<\/p>\n

Initially, the only things I could see were shadows. I navigated by scent and memory. This is\u00a0the lemon tree; here the orange; here the fig. Here is the pear, the pomegranate and the peach.<\/p>\n

Go further<\/em>, my mother said. Glamour\u00a0is dangerous magic.\u00a0<\/em>So I left the orchard, pushed through into the forest. Stones and twigs beneath my feet. Uneven ground. Things that slither; things that bite.\u00a0Take off your shoes<\/em>, she whispered.\u00a0Take off your dress.<\/em><\/p>\n

Down the hill I walked. No, nothing so elegant. I slipped, half-tumbled. Something wet and living brushed my cheek. I stood in the dam,\u00a0mud and weed. Above my head, the stars thrown carelessly into the sky. I wept.<\/p>\n

That night, I crushed the pills into her wine. You will always be beautiful<\/em>, my mother\u00a0said.\u00a0You will always be strange.<\/em><\/p>\n

I held out the cup. \u00a0She drank it all, bitter though it was, and thanked me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the weeks\u00a0leading up to my mother’s death, I went out into the orchard\u00a0each night\u00a0and trained myself to see in the dark. This was at her insistence. A training I at first refused. Initially, the only things I could see were shadows. I navigated by scent and memory. This is\u00a0the lemon tree; here the orange;…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1767,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[725,288],"tags":[722,727,1007,1009,1010,1008,728],"class_list":["post-1765","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-200-words-200-days","category-short-works","tag-200-days","tag-200-words","tag-ashley-ellis","tag-deborah-ory","tag-glamour","tag-ken-browar","tag-microfiction"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4LH1G-st","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/01_AshleyEllis_00781.jpg?fit=806%2C1008","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1765"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1765\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1834,"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1765\/revisions\/1834"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.perilousadventures.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}