I had a good class today, for the most part — my turnouts were turnt, port de bras ported, etc. For once, I managed not to rack up the greatest number of “support your elbow” reminders in class (instead, for me, today was all about “Lift out of the hips sockets!”).

Adage felt shockingly solid. Somehow, somewhere along the line, I’ve more or less completely stopped sucking at adagio? Part of it was definitely the music. No idea what it was, but it was beautiful, and I was like, “Ohhh yeah, feeling this music, w00t,” and not all like, “OMG OMG I HAVE TO GET MY LEG UP NOW AND NOT FALL DOWN OMFG. OMG NOW I HAVE TO ROND EN L’AIR. CRAP, WHICH ONE IS THIRD ARABESQUE??!!! O NOES O NOES.”

(Some of that, BTW, was simply the effect of finally being able to feel confident about remembering which arabesque was which. It’s amazing how much just NOT HAVING TO THINK helps with arabesques.)

Turns terre-a-terre were just like, “Doubles, sure, why not?” on the first pass. Like, doubles happening without even thinking about it. Just: Ohai, that was a double! Ohai, that one, too! On the second pass, I was busy thinking about a transition detail (a part that went tombe-pas de bourée-fondue arabesque-to-relevé, failli through, turn en dehors, pivot with rond de jambe) and threw out a mix of singles and doubles, but that was okay.

By the time we got started with jumps, though, I was feeling tired (in fact, I already felt a little cooked after grand battement). I made it through the warm-up jumps and the first petit allegro combination (in fact, that one went shockingly well in terms of remembering what was supposed to happen — it was just, like, there when I needed it, pas de basque and everything).

But then we got to our last combination, which was basically medium allegro, and it was jsut like … bleh.

My assemblés sucked. I felt slow and heavy and imprecise. Beats happened (more or less by divine intervention, as far as I can tell), as did, by some miracle, this jeté-coupé-balonné thing that I didn’t think I even had. Beyond that, though, the whole combination felt, I don’t know, dumpy. By which I mean, more or less what I think a dump truck would feel like if it tried to do medium allegro.

After class, though, I said something to Ms. B about feeling way out of shape, and she replied, “Well, you didn’t look out of shape!”

So, basically, my perception was that I was a gigantic mess by the end. Hers, on the other hand, seemed rather otherwise.

I guess this says a lot about how often we only see the worst in ourselves.

And then, this was another of those classes that, looking back, I realize I couldn’t have done a year ago. Not like I did today. I would have made it through, but it would’ve been harder, and I wouldn’t have danced as well.

Bit by bit, we move forward.

Anyway, that’s it for now. No class with BW tomorrow because Swan Lake is happening. I’m going to see it on Saturday. Can’t wait!