Nutcrackers
I am always a bit nervous learning choreography and performance stuff. The rest of the studio is the total opposite where they can hardly finish class due to sheer excitement because we have rehearsal after class. I am learning snowflake from Nutcracker, which everyone else seemed absolutely elated about performing because they love being on stage and they love Christmas. The choreography seems a bit easier for me to memorize for now and I also feel a bit stronger.
I’m scared of getting better at dance. Like, finalllllyyy after allllll of these years. I feel like how hard work is starting to finally pay off.
My body is so incredibly sore from dance this past week but must —- keep —- going.
The dancers all told me to get elastics ribbons instead of satin ribbons for my shoes. And to get full pointe shoes now so I can dance “on pointe” with them.
Olivia, one of the teenagers, told me I’m such a great dancer and I almost cried.
12/15/21
Nutcracker turned out to be a healthy dose of chaos mixed with a whirlwind of emotion, nerves and excitement. The backstage drama alternated from dancers almost fainting, losing their costumes —finding their costumes— worrying about their school bullies showing up to their performance, a few of the main acts crying from being overwhelmed, and all the best drama one could wish to experience backstage at a ballet. Everyone was sweating profusely, taking their shoes on and off from being sore and heaving in and out of breath as they rushed from onstage to offstage to do a quick change and to go back onstage.
I felt so terribly nervous since I missed the blocking rehearsal (which I will NEVER do again) because I worked late the night before and couldn't get to the theatre in time in the morning. The stage was much larger than I anticipated and the choreographers changed entrances and exits and I missed it all and just prayed for the best during the performance. It all turned out relatively fine and I was more confident than I thought I would be..
I’m extremely excited for the last night of Nutcracker and also exhausted. It was so much fun last night but my feet hurt horrendously afterward like I had two raw feet. I could hardly walk and I hobbled out of the performance in my socks because I couldn’t even put my tennis shoes on. I also didn’t sleep at all that night, due to worrying if I could perform the following night.
However, I woke up and my feet were not swollen and seemed to be okay enough to walk on. So I showered and got up to the performance as soon as I could. The final night of Nutcracker was a total success and helping the kids onstage made me forget again about my own nerves. Everyone did a fantastic job and we all clapped, hooting and hollering after the curtain dropped because we thought it was such hard work and truly was fun.
Russian
Spanish
Soldier
Chinese
Snow
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Cheetos, red wine, cat food and bubble bath was my gloomy midwinter purchase at the local pharmacy during the third wave of covid.
“Please don’t judge me,” I said sheepishly to the cashier who let out a chuckle.
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Watching the small woman sweep the sidewalk in front of her nail salon and the alcoholics go to the liquor store with increasing purple faces.
Watching the brand new tattoo shop open across the street and close two months later.
The daily walking of dogs by people who just put in headphones and wander aimlessly about.
(notes from my balcony during lockdown)
*****
The new strain of covid (omicron) was spreading twice as rapidly as the first one, two years later. The vaccinated and boosted were getting the new strain. It was a bit scary and a lot more intrusive and widespread than I originally thought. It hit Seattle after the Nutcracker season and around Christmas 2021. I spent Christmas Eve going to the noon performance at the sparkling and beautiful McCaw Hall with N and then singing karaoke in my living room late at night—after having some red wine— as he belted out New York State of Mind and we could care less what the neighbors thought since I never made a peep in five years and we were both overworked and underpaid. The jewel-colored twinkling lights of the aromatic Pacific Northwest pine twinkled in the background as we enjoyed singing madly, playing the guitar and laughing at our audacity to “let go.” It was one of the best Christmases of my life, as my new, sweet cat popped in and out of checking on us and hiding from us. It started to snow that night as I laid on his chest and inhaled a deep breath of happiness. We continued to feast like kings as it snowed wildly and we were both called off work; him for the snow and me for an alleged covid contamination at my work. I happened to buy a lot of groceries at work before Christmas, and due to the weather and unexpected events, we would need these groceries to sustain our more than planned one day together.
We watched movies, brushed my new cat, drank hot cocoa, talked about human psychology, Capitalism, life and chess. I felt so at home with him as I eyed him from the corner of the room and thought about how handsome he looked for the millionth-time in blue jeans, a jade green sweater and a khaki beanie. I wanted to remember this Christmas forever. Happiness. Laughing. Crying over watching the video of my horrible ballet performance while my sweet boyfriend told me it was amazing. The smell of evergreen. Watching heaps of Christmas movies. Sitting by the electric heater. Wrapping presents. Having all of my plants inside due to the weather making it feel a little tropical in my apartment (despite the temperature). Sitting on my porch while it was snowing, drinking coffee and laughing at all the horrible drivers while saying hello the passing pedestrian neighbors. Playing trivia in my bed at night.
I felt relieved to be off of work for a few days.
***
A few days turned into a week and I stood in line in the frigid winter air for over two hours with wet boots freezing and waiting my turn for my Covid test. The rich pulled up in Range Rovers and went to the “appointment” line, while others froze out in the winter air for hours on end. I couldn’t help but feel a pang in my heart for these poor people, who the others “with appointments”, somehow managed to totally ignore.
The new variant was worst than the first and scarier as one would predict a virus to be. I heard whispers from the families in line as they talked about how someone at Christmas a few days ago tested positive for COVID and stressing if they all had it as they wore expensive snow gear and expensive boots. Another woman in front of me clearly displayed symptoms of a cold after aggressively blowing her nose and keeping her distance. The snow and ice had occurred at Christmas and everyone meeting up with family ended up snowed in and probably contracting Covid, despite the vaccines and boosters.
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We all were still reeling from the latest Omnicron strain which everyone on the planet seemed to get. I tested negative for it and seemed to dodge a bullet as it seemed to decimate everyone in its reach. At times, I felt like this couldn’t possibly be real life and we aren’t living in this reality. This disease. These times. The masks. And vaccines. It seemed like something little Jodie once read about in sixth grade in a book called the Andromeda Strain by Michael Chricton. I remember thinking, “hmmm. crazy…that would never happen” EL OH EL. How young and naive I once was. I sometimes miss that little girl so much and how she thought the world would never contain such hardships.
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I was going back to hip-hop class after ten years and was terrified. The class turned out to be so much fun and possibly my new favorite dance class and I CAN’T BELIEVE I almost didn’t go!!
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Things I always want to remember:
The old moss-ridden oak tree outside my bedroom window
The smell of the diner below the ballet studio, torturing us daily.
The feeling of buying groceries when you really need them.
The smell of the beautiful, sprawling mountains sitting atop the cerulean sparkling ocean on my walk to work.
Borrowed line poetry:
Nobody in the lane and nothing, nothing but blackberries
Blackberries on either side, though on the right mainly
This is the exact view where I run sometimes, a few days a week
The blackberries cover and smother and strangle the rest of the foliage on the hill
The invasive plant that ruins one’s yard, the million dollar houses where a Seattleite is bound to complain about blackberries because that they lower one’s property value
But I think they are unique and delicate, the original food source for us (or have we forgotten?)
They sprawl a deep emerald, nourishing the wildlife around, making a hill side much more beautiful and therapeutic, opposed to a pile of concrete.