Thursday, June 30, 2011

The Vertical Barre

Our ballet studio is above a strip club.
It's nice to know that dancers have options.

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Triple Threat

I pulled off a triple threat this week. Not by singing, dancing & acting well, but by threatening to make a real ass of myself three times this week at ballet class.

White Swan missed Tuesday's class because of work. It was relatively uneventful but brought up a growing pet peeve of mine; wearing t-shirts in ballet class. I have been the fluffiest person in every class and I squeeze myself into a leotard and tights and not due to a lack of self consciousness or an amazing body image. It's so the teacher & I can see what I'm doing because I genuinely want to improve at this. Those skinny chicks need to lose the t-shirts or I'm gonna steal their part in Swan Lake.

Thursday's class kicked the swan's tail feathers. We had a substitute teacher and she was tough. We are adult beginners, lady, not retired prima-b's.

Saturday classes are our favorite. It's less crowded, the sun is streaming through the studio windows and instead of dealing with the aftermath of a day at work, we have the weekend ahead of us. I love lining up at the barre at 9 am and hearing a ripple of knees cracking down the barre as we go into our first grand plié. It is an adult ballet class, after all.

- Black Swan

Monday, June 13, 2011

Gluttons for Punishment

So, I'm going to go ahead and start this blog post with a double apology. First, I want to apologize for the swans' extended absence. Black Swan migrated to a land far, far away and while she was gone, I just got plain old lazy. I mean, let's face it, Black Swan is the funny one in this duo. And the organized one. And the motivated writer. Which brings me to my second apology - I will go ahead and say I'm sorry in advance for what I'm assuming will be a disjointed flow of ideas, not unlike brain diarrhea. Ok, I have to apologize for that terrible metaphor. Which makes 3 apologies. In one paragraph. We are off to a good start!

Anyway, the swans attended their first class together last Saturday (we each had attended one solo class). And man, were we out of shape! I mean, I know it's much easier to lose ground in dance or exercise than it is to gain it, but this felt like our first class all over again. During barre, we did relevés on one foot. By the end of the combination, neither of us could get more than half way up over our toes. And our grand battements were anything but. And don't get me started on the chainé turns. No really, don't!

But, we had fun (as usual). Taking a moment in between each exercise to laugh at ourselves and regain at least a tiny bit of composure before beginning the next masochistic combination. And we'll be back twice a week for more punishment.

~White Swan