Okay, so I'm not quite at forty yet. According to my calendar, last night marked my thirty-ninth ballet class since I started in September. I have missed classes here and there for other commitments, but by and large I have made it a point to go to every Tuesday and Thursday nights for the beginner course, and I have been enjoying it.
In the last couple of weeks, I think I can finally say I have observed real improvement. For one thing, my teachers do not automatically say "Drop your shoulders," every time they look at me, which was a real problem I'd been having. My ballet arms struck me as incredibly ugly for the longest time, but now when I look at myself in the mirror they seem to look a lot more like they're supposed to. Also, the nature of the critiques I've been getting has grown more particular. You know when your teacher's comments get increasingly nitpicky that you're making forward progress and doing a better job. I am really pleased by this, as this is something I would really love to develop proficiency in. Especially since when I started I had a hard time feeling how the way my body was working didn't conform to what it was supposed to be doing.
Here's an example. I have always had good turnout, apparently, as I received several compliments on it right away and continue to do so. I suspect it has to do with the fact that turnout comes from the outward rotation of the hips, and my hips are far and away the most flexible part of my body. The only factor limiting my turnout is, no surprise, my knees, which are conversely the tightest and least flexible. Still, I'd been feeling slightly off, especially since I think that even though I can do turnout right, it was making my feet become pronated. Nobody's said anything about it, so maybe it's not that bad, but I can feel my feet slightly rolling towards my ankle. But recently something clicked for me that I think helped me do better. We had a substitute teacher one week from another studio, and I don't remember exactly what it was that she said, but with her I suddenly grasped that if I made a point of lifting my hips, I would bring my weight more directly over my legs rather than allowing it to pull back against them. That lack of pulling back took a lot of the pressure off my knees when turned out, which caused my feet to pronate in order to maintain balance. Making that posture change helped enormously, soothing my knees and easing the pronation, and I am working to maintain it as I dance.
Of course my technique is still beginner-baby-lame. My biggest challenges now mostly boil down to the fact that while I'm relatively fit, I am just not strong enough to always manipulate my muscles properly. Ballet takes an enormous amount of strength to constantly maintain correct position and balance as you go through the movements, and I'm just not there yet. I often end up with twitchy muscles the next day, like the maddening little flurry that won't get out of my kneecap right now. At least it's encouraging me to stretch more, and that not only helps my dancing but also my daily comfort; my tight knees really do plague me. But the more tired I get, the more wobbly or floppy I become. I should be practicing more. To that end, I have a weird idea that I'm going to see if I can put into action.
One problem with practicing ballet is that you need the right surface to do it on so your shoes slide right over it. I try to go to the dance studio in Gosman when I can, but it's usually occupied. So I have a weird little idea that I'm not sure is going to work but I kind of want to try it anyway. I noticed in the dollar store that you can buy cheap, approximately one foot square linoleum tiles that you can lay on your own. I think they're self-adhesive. Probably not the best thing you can use for flooring, but designed for a budget, and smooth enough to slide over. I want to buy a bunch of them, stick them to a big sturdy piece of cloth, and see if I can make a smooth mini-ballet surface I can lay out when I want to practice and fold up like a game board when I want to put it away. It would have to be small, which means I would only be able to do stationary stuff on it, but that's better than no practice at all, and I could use it whenever I felt like practicing. Again, who knows if that will work, but it wouldn't be a big investment of time or resources, so it's worth a try. It would likely encourage me to work at ballet more.
This is my current favorite image of ballet. You go, bear. Best pas de deux ever.
