(Sort of.)

First, I didn’t make it to Killer Class this morning.

I’ve been wrestling a nastier-than-usual episode of insomnia, but I’ve been trying not to take sleeping pills because they can screw with my mood. Last night, I was exhausted but just plain couldn’t get to sleep, so I finally took a sleeping pill at 3 AM.

When I woke up at 9, I knew within seconds that neither driving nor riding a bike was a good idea. The sleeping pill I took hadn’t worn off enough. So I went back to sleep and did evening class instead, which was actually pretty nice. I made myself do everything on relevé that could be done on relevé, of course, as penance (and also because that’s what I would have done anyway).

I also applied the note that JMG gave me about balancé back on Sunday. For some reason, I’d fallen into the habit of doing this weird up, down, up movement instead of the canonical down, up, up. JMG pointed out that it’s not necessarily wrong (sometimes choreographers want stuff like that), but it’s an alternative approach. I also think it isn’t really as pretty (and it looks weird when everyone’s doing down, up, up and you’re the only one going up, down, up.

Anyway, my balancés looked nicer tonight than they have in a while.

On to rep. We got into the meat of my part tonight. The girls are divided into three groups by height. BG has nicknamed them “Fun Size,” “Sirens,” and “Amazons,” and in this section I’m partnering the Sirens, and they kind of turn into my posse.

I mean, like, a beautiful, balletic posse, of course. Not the kind with pitchforks and torches.

The choreography isn’t hard, but it’s lovely. I’m happy with that: we don’t have a whole lot of rehearsal time before we show this piece to the universe, so I’m glad that BG has put together a dance that we can do well in the time available, but which still looks like legit ballet.

After rehearsal, I told one of the Sirens that they were really looking good, and she said, “I’m glad we’re dancing with you!”

Apparently, she likes the way I dance. w00t! (It so happens that I like the way she dances, too. We make a good team, which is good, because we’re also both sweaty disaster areas and have totally bonded about that.)

I do feel like I’m getting it back for real. I keep laughing at myself, because I say this Every. Single. Class.

I mean, seriously. Class ends, and I’m like:”It’s not 100% yet, but I feel like it’s coming back!”

Anyway, today the turnouts were doing their job, the arms had their waterfowls in a linear array, and I didn’t fall out of my turns (though I did keep proactively spotting, AGAIN).

Likewise, my jumps are regaining their ballon. Especially the sautés Arabesque in the rep piece—they were light and high, and not as “Heil Hitler-y” as they’ve occasionally been in the past.

Which is good, because I don’t want to give the wrong impression, here 😐

I do have to better work out this one part where I dodge between the Sirens. The spacing can make it challenging—they’re all standing in 4th arabesque à terre as I sort of lightly and gracefully run through the line of them in such a way that I wind up at the head of the line facing them in 2nd arabesque à terre. Or, at least, that’s how it’s supposed to work. We need to work on the blocking so there’s a little more room.

At this point, I’m really looking forward to learning the rest of the dance. I’m having no trouble at all remembering my part, which is good, because I can’t exactly follow anyone.

Anyway, I’m pretty tired, so I’m going to call it a night.