Member-only story
The Person You Insult Today Might Be In A Position of Authority Tomorrow
I was a baby belly dancer with stars in my eyes. I had traveled to the big city to watch a belly dance show and after the show was over I approached one of the dancers. I told her I loved her dance and she gave me a look. Have you heard the expression “looking down your nose at someone?” Well that’s the best description I have for her look.
“Why are you talking to me, she asked?” Then she turned her back on me and walked over to another performer.
I had been officially and dramatically snubbed!
25 years later I was the owner and editor of an international belly dance magazine and I was at an international event with a table of my magazines. This same dancer walked up to the table and said, “You aren’t very friendly are you!? Why have you never asked me to be on the cover of Jareeda?”
I was no longer a baby belly dancer and had grown into an empowered professional dancer. I looked at her and smiled. “Do you really want to know?”
Of course she said she did, so I told her the story of how she had snubbed me as a baby belly dancer. I told her it was water long gone under the bridge and I held no grudges, but it had never occurred to me to ask her to be on the cover of my magazine.