Butterflies Don't Swim

When Maya got out of her mother's car and marched somewhat ceremoniously towards the school door, she didn't know what to expect. She knew what she had hoped for; that she wasn't the only one who had tried to circumvent the new dress code in her own rebellious way; she hoped that, in fact, many other girls hadn't abided by the new rules even one bit. She paused for a moment thinking what if she was really the only one who was following the new rules just a little bit. Wouldn't she appear to be a girl without back bone; a girl without strength to stand up to authority; a girl who didn't know what she really believed in or stood up for? Well, she had to put all those thoughts out of her mind and walk towards the school entrance door with a fast beating heart and an almost explosive anticipation as to what she might find behind the door. 10th grade was lurking behind that door.

It was the first day of school after a tumultuous summer of dramatic and irrevocable changes. A summer after the Iranian revolution took place; the revolutionaries had overthrown the Shah's regime a few months earlier during the previous school year. Maya was 15 then, in 9th grade. Prior to the revolution all the girls in her school were concerned with looking pretty, with various hair styles and cool magazines. With western music; Rolling Stones, Crosby, Stills, and Nash, and of course Bee Gees! Maya and her best friend Mira had choregraphed a terrific dance to the music of Saturday Night Fever! Und they would have given their souls and promised their first-born for sure, if they could have gotten their hands on a copy of the film Saturday Night Fever. They had only heard about it and never seen it. In basketball, Maya and Mira's team had advanced to the semi-finals. Mira loved to play Basketball, Maya loved to play with Mira. Maya was also concerned with poetry. Poems, she thought, had a way of sweeping her off her feet and sending her to into a world of adventures. She had decided that no matter what the poem, it would be up to her to decide its meaning and therefore the kind of adventure it would entail. And of course, she loved to swim. Swim in the pool, in the pond, in the Caspian Sea. Anywhere, so long as she could jump in and stretch her soul all over the body of water she was to conquer. Swimming was like poetry; a sort of an undefined unknown that could take shape and form based on what Maya liked. Every time she swam, in her mind she was like a butterfly picking a new flower to cherish.

Then the revolution happened. It happened like the creeping up of a winter Cold, slowly first with a little sore throat, eye itching, a minor head ache, and then a little time later with a full-blown fever and the whole darn Flu! First, it was the grown-ups talking in the living room in the late-night hours. Maya would stay up late secretly to listen in on their conversation from behind the big brown living room couch; lots of new things to process; Shah was exploiting the country; he was imprisoning and killing his opposition; he was working for the USA against the interests of his country. There was a revolution being born; people standing up for people. People wanting to have a democracy; getting to vote. Shah was a monarch. He wasn't voted into office; he was born into leading the country. Maya's Dad and Uncle sounded really excited about the prospect of democracy for Iran. They were intellectuals, so to speak. They had always talked of complex things like philosophy and human rights, but now they were talking about something that was so near one's skin; a revolution. What is a revolution, Maya thought, even though she knew the meaning of the word revolution. Revolution was ending something old and starting something new...kind of by force. That was all there was to it. Maya's Mom didn't sound so excited. She sounded doubtful. Leave it to Mom to question everything that sounded like a party. Then, it was the school; suddenly, there were new books, lots of books about uprising; about ideas; about how to fight the system. Suddenly all the girls read and discussed and were passionate about politics. Politics used to be just a thing. Now politics was the only thing. Despite all the differences in their thinking, all the girls in her school wanted democracy and wanted Shah out. And then finally, like the full-blown Flu that it was, demonstrations began; millions of people ran into streets carrying signs and demanding that Shah steps down. Then, there were the bullets, the shooting, the demonstrating students at the University who were shot dead by Shah's soldiers. And their pictures plastered all over the newspapers. Soon, Shah left the country. Revolutionaries declared victory. They took charge.

That was pretty much 9th grade in a nut shell. And Maya tried not to look or see. But, she couldn't have walked all over her school with shut eyes if she didn't want to stumble and fall. Stumble and fall she did, with eyes wide open; there was her best friend Mira who had suddenly very strong views about religion; she didn't care about Bee Gees and dance moves anymore; or about laughter or silliness for that matter. Even though, they still sat next to each other, it felt like there was the Caspian Ocean occupying the space between them. There was also the new girl Shiva who had started off 9th grade becoming Maya's second best friend, but at the end of the school year, she had stopped talking to her and began turning her back on her with no explanation leaving Maya feeling robbed of all the fun talks they used to have. 9th grade had turned into a poem that caused nightmares and had to be forgotten and replaced with a joyful sonnet as soon as possible. Summer couldn't have come fast enough.

Summer wasn't like any other summer before. Maya and her family used to spend summers up north by the beach of the Caspian Sea in a serene and tidy villa. Maya would swim all day in the ocean, while having her boombox play her favorite music on the sand. Her Mom and Dad would talk and walk. Dinner was the most glorious part of the day because it was always festive and delicious. Maya would always conjure up the strongest appetite by the end of the day and eat herself to distraction. The Summer after 9th grade was different; Maya wasn't allowed to swim. She was a girl, she was told. Suddenly, women weren't allowed to wear a bathing suit and swim in the ocean. New rules. Revolution had brought a mountain of new rules. Rules that sounded suffocating. No more music! She wasn't allowed to listen to music, either. How can one exist without music? Maya felt her limbs being torn apart from her. How could she be where she always was during this time of the year and not be able to do what she always used to do during this time of the year? She had always been a girl swimming in the ocean. The ocean belonged to her and she belonged to the ocean. So, she sat on the sand watching the waves every single day from dawn to dusk, sometimes building sand castles, sometimes reading poetry, sometimes burying her body under the sand. Dreaming was the only consolation; she would picture herself suddenly getting up, starting to run towards the waves and splashing into the ocean and feeling the sizzling sensation of the water on her hungry skin; kicking, pushing, swimming, swimming, swimming...but, dreaming of swimming wasn't enough. Maya felt melancholy and confusion; a myriad of feelings that she couldn't process. So, she kept on dreaming.

Until Summer ended. A letter was in the mail; the new school dress code! All the girls had to cover their hair with a head scarf, wear a long, loose dark uniform that went all the way down beneath their knees. How was Maya to run around, play Basketball or even feel comfortable in that outfit. Where was one to find such a horrid-looking, confining garment?! Mayas mother began the tedious task of sewing such a uniform, but tried to make it less oppressive, less overwhelming. Not as long as beneath the knees, above the knees. Not that loose, no, a bit more form-fitting, like a beautiful dress. And the head scarf? Well, how about a nice scarf that doesn't go around the neck but rather looks like the way Grace Kelly used to wear a scarf; fashionable with an open, free neck. Maya and her Mom thought the new outfit was absolutely gorgeous.

So, there she was, Maya heading towards the school entrance door on the first day of 10th grade wondering how every other girl would be dressed. Wondering if everyone came up with ideas of defying the dress code in their own special way, or if she was the only one doing that. She stepped into the big door frame of Batsan High school and stretched her neck and looked around the open wide space populated with hundreds of girls all dressed in long, black uniforms that covered their neck, their hair, every inch of them but their faces. It looked like a massive painting of black crows; some scattered, some in groups, large and small, some solitary, but all of them were black crows. Maya was floored. Suddenly feeling her hands searching for her head scarf trying to change the Grace Kelly look to fit the look of everyone else. Feeling self-conscious, oh, if only she had followed the guidelines to a tooth like everyone else. Quickly she tied her headscarf under her neck covering all her hair. She saw some familiar faces from 9th grade; everyone was somber, quiet, and standing in line and waiting for classes to start. Everyone's eyes seemed hollow and motionless. Maya found a spot in the line for 10th grade. There were a few minutes left until the line would march up towards the 10th grade classroom. Suddenly, she felt a hand grabbing her shoulder from behind and then she recognized Mira's voice: "Guess what I've got in my backpack, a VHS of Saturday Night Fever!"