There’s No Way I Could Forget: Spinning

Spinning. By Tillie Walden. First Second, 2017. ISBN 978-1626729407. $17.99, 400 pages. Nominated for a 2018 Excellence in Graphic Literature Award.

The feeling of waiting curbside for a ride in the predawn cold, watching headlights sweep through the darkness.

Of peering out windows on sleepy car rides. Of early-morning arrival at the ice rink.

Of locker rooms, benches, and earbuds, of lacing up your ice skates, everyone in their own little orbit, quietly, tensely readying themselves.

Of being the new girl, of being sized up to see if you are “a threat.”

Of skating across the ice, jumping and falling, your eyeglasses flinging off and away.

The feeling of a teacher’s hands on your shoulders, helping you on with your jacket, and the inward recognition that you are gay.

Of sidelong glances in a classroom, “dizzy” with longing.

Of walking in a crowd of girls, talking about Twilight (Edward or Jacob?), while hiding who you are.

Of playing “never have I ever” with the girls while hiding who you are.

Of passing.

Of trying to recreate, as a skater, with your body, the “tiny graphs and charts,” the “intricate patterns and minute details,” of an instruction book.

Of desperately holding hands during a synchro skating routine. Even as the speed is “ripping them apart.” Holding on for dear life.

Of friendship as a lifeline. As rivalry and sympathy intermingled.

The feeling of being judged, as your teammate speeds up to walk a few paces ahead of you.

Of winning and losing, of exulting in first place and weeping when you lose. Of knowing that you cannot always be the won that wins. The tears of your competitors, and your own.

The dread of the school bully, rendered faceless in memory but still so powerfully there.

Your hands nervously playing in your lap, or gripping your knees. Your teacher questioning you.

The feeling of falling asleep next to your brother by the light of a laptop screen.

Of crying from the makeup in your eyes. Of pulling a blanket up over your head.

The sight of the girl you like stretching, and quietly smiling at you.

The feeling of being alone with her. Of love, bounded by fear.

Of kissing: I didn’t know it would feel like that.

Of capering in a hotel room, alone, free from anyone’s judgment.

Gazing into your reflection in the surface of a vending machine.

The felt “eternity” of a three-minute skating routine.

Feet in the air, in mid-jump.

Stares and glances. Stares and glances. Girlhood as competitive arena.

The feeling of being tested, and failing.

Of being alone in a closed room with a tutor who treats you as a thing. The memory of his hand.

The feeling of coming out, in a broad, silent room crossed by a slanting beam of sunlight, your mother huddled, tense.

Of coming out to your music teacher, in a loving embrace.

The sensation of drawing. Of time collapsed into drawing.

Of a skate remembered as a nervous, tight grid of panels. Of moves and thoughts flickering. Of falling. Oh my god / my coach is looking at me / the audience shit / the judges

The sight of oncoming headlights like round staring eyes.

The memory of his hand.

Of quitting skating. Walking away.

Driving away, crying.

Of returning to the rink, once more, just to prove that you can leave. (There’s no way I could forget.)

For all these experiences, and many more--so finely observed, so precisely caught, in a style at once tense and graceful, minimal yet conveying every telling detail, rigorous and yet so light and free—for all this, Tillie Walden’s memoir Spinning is an unforgettable comic, the kind that gets inside your mind and heart. I cannot recommend it highly enough.