Let It Snow
Classes are long and daunting. I finally am able to go to one advanced class a week and two intermediate classes. I could cry. In fact, I cry when I leave the studio after they tell me I can advance. FINALLY!!
Ballet is kicking my ever-loving arse every day, with five classes a week; three ballet, one technique and one hip hop.
I must never forget this feeling of the grind. The hustle to make it. The exhaustion. Too many coffees. Creaking knees. Popping aspirin everyday due to body aches.
Yesterday, we had surprise nutcracker tryouts after a long week and me barely making it to class at all due to work, yet again. They blindside us with this announcement, while I am in my very FIRST advanced class. I want to desperately “go to the bathroom” and not come back into the classroom at all. But I think to myself that it would be fun to learn the choreography to one of the most famous ballets and to just go for it.
Most of the girls in my level —-the newly advanced —- don’t show up that day so I am left in the group with the brave few who are willing to go for it despite it being out of our placement and technique ability.
The fact that I am so tired honestly helps me to not stress out about it and just do it. Although once the choreography starts being demonstrated, I am immediately paralyzed with fear. However, I surprise myself with how quickly I pick up a lot of the choreography and how confident I am to at least try.
Rehearsals have quickly gone from “fun” and “Christmasy” to advanced and me fearing for my life and wildly panicking, gripping the barre in the beginning of class with much anxiety and new layers of fear I have not felt before. Some of the choreography is out of my comfort zone and about two hours into every class, I am dying from the mental inability to catch up. I ask myself how I am ever going to teach adult ballet if can’t even remember a simple move or how choreography begins and ends? I start to spiral again and let myself yammer on in my own head about it and start to not pay attention and then start to lose the count of the music and then the next move and then I slowly see my face shading into a deep crimson.
But it’s all part of the process I suppose.
The growing and fear and lethargy and trials and tribulations.
**
Rehearsal is all getting very exhausting but since we are all growing into better dancers we are learning more quickly. I really adore the Spanish and Arabian dance. Something about the other cultures I find so mysterious and allusive. Waltz of the Flowers and Snow are very beautiful.. I am trying and failing quite a bit to hit the gym daily, in addition to dance. Cross training is so very very hard!
I know this is horrible but I’m not quite as fit as I am hoping before the performance/less bloated. I want to show progression and eventually be as comfortable in my own skin as I was in high school. I miss those days so much sometimes.
**
Rehearsals are now going much better than I thought. I feel stronger and more graceful. I’m exhausted however and spend a lot of time recouping my legs, feet, muscles, and energy level knowing it’s going to take days and not 12 hours.
It’s hard to not feel left out. It’s hard to know I have a night off and don’t have enough energy to get dressed up and go participate in life’s adulting weekend. I cut my toenails too short this week and I am dying because they hurt so bad whether I am in class or just walking up the street. I normally spend one day out of every fourteen completely gassed and emotional. I crave strength and re-vitality. I find myself constantly lost in a daydream of going out for a night on the town, dressed up and feeling amazing in my winter heels. I imagine going to every cool concert plus having enough energy to go to the gym every day. Wouldn’t that be the life??
The one part of Nutcracker that is my biggest challenge and hurdle is the pique, pique, soutenu, soutenu, turns we have in the Snow dance. For the life of me, I rehearse them day and night at the gym and in class. However, I can’t seem to grasp them because of the speed and now it’s to the point the entire class silently (and sometimes not so silently) cheers me on during this part which I adore but now find even more embarrassing. To further add to the visual illustration of how challenging this is, I am sandwiched between the two best and quickest advanced dancers for these turns and it’s the most distracting and daunting thing in the world. The lead dancer is in front of me. She is sharp, quick, a phenomenal turner and in control. Her best friend is behind me. Also tall, fast and a soloist. If I don’t move fast enough I will be ballet roadkill. It’s the elephant in the room that I cannot conquer, and I have one of these parts of choreography that I get caught up on every. single. performance.
How does one totally encompass and become a dance?
***
Nutcracker is this week and I’m ecstatic. It’s the first performance I feel prepared and slightly more confident that normal. I’m still nervous about the pique soutenu turns in Snow but everything else I’m happy with, I think. Or not totally terrified, as usual.
I spent most of Nutcracker rather rested (opposed to the trainwreck of last year where I worked and went to rehearsals…never again) and this rest is providing me with more chance to relax and enjoy the experience. I am wearing a beautiful costume in Waltz of the Flowers and although I have to perform half of the performance in flat shoes and the other half in demi-pointe thanks to a cracked toenail, I am ecstatic to be getting better. I had previously wanted to do the entire performance on pointe, but I realized how unrealistic this goal is since I got my first full pointe shoes only 8 weeks before the show, with a cracked toenail to boot. So I train regardless in my new pointe shoes and experience a recipe for disaster. I end up cracking my toenail even further down and messing up my right big toe as well. Thus, I am the only one not doing the performance on pointe. I am a little embarrassed about it but what can I do? My demi-pointe shoes were completely worn out and soft, but I havn’t time to go get another pair and decide to just accept that I couldn’t conquer all my goals by the end of the year, and that’s okay. It’s not worth regression to force quick progression.
The show went wonderful. The dancers were all upbeat and supportive to each other in the wings. They show up early and are eager to rehearse everything a hundred times to no end. I help some of them put their hair in performance buns, which I have never done on another head that isn’t my own, and it turns out I’m pretty good at doing ballet buns. In fact, it is much easier to do it on another dancer opposed to doing my own in the mirror. Everyone is wearing red lipstick, blush and light mascara, and everyone’s costumes look absolutely stunning under stage lights. I feel the most insecure in my snow costume -- all white just isn’t my favorite color/flattering color to wear. I lovee our bright blue Arabian costumes and brightly colored jewel toned, flowery Waltz of the Flower’s costumes. Spanish costumes are also vibrantly pretty with red and black jewels and flowing skirts.
My personal favorite performance is the final dance, Waltz of the Flowers. It is over seven minutes long and is absolutely brutal to build and utilize that much stamina, especially at the end of the show. It looks so beautiful when performed and the choreography is advanced, challenging and pretty.
I didn’t exactly slay the dragon of pique soutenu turns during Snow (boo). First, we discover during rehearsal right before the show they have the wrong track for Snow and the music is four times faster than our performance piece. FOUR TIMES. The look on everyones face when we realize the wrong track is playing is priceless. They make us rehearse with it anyway (the show must ALWAYS go on) and it is like watching a ballet car pile-up on the freeway. Our teachers face from the audience is a face of duress, cringe and her eyes are slightly closed. The dancers are all confused, laughing, almost crying, and panicking. White tutus and sparkles are flying through the air in a ballet blizzard of chaos.
This music mishap throws me off and I am just praying to the ballet gods when the Snow track starts during the performance in an hour, that they fix the mishap. And they do. On top of all that, our lead dancer is out sick for the first performance, and I have to lead the turns on the first night in the front row on stage. *Sobbing profusely* Why me? I muster up all the ballet courage I can but I am so nervous I can’t exactly relax enough to execute. AND. Two of the dancers slam into each other and fall during Snow which is a bit distracting.
The costume changes all go smoothly, and I don’t miss any performance cues like I did during the spring show (eek!)
The last night, our lead dancer makes the performance and I nail most of the turns musically and only “fell short” of four counts of turns.
By the very end of the final performance, on the final night, I want to just collapse. My boyfriend brought me flowers and one of my best friends came to watch me as well. I demand we immediately go get Mexican food and spend the night in a haze of performance serotinin and being proud of myself. And also delirium. The most delirious I have ever been to date.
Will this dancer improve and finally be place in all advanced classes by the spring performance? Will her toenail heal, and will she be able to perform on pointe for the spring performance? Will she conquer all choreography effortlessly? Stay tuned.
