cabriole is the new assemblé

If orange (or gray, or puce, or what-the-hell-ever) is the new black, then cabrioles are the new assemblé. If you obsessively memorize every thing I post here (and let's face it, even I don't do that. Well. Not always.) then you know that assemblé has traditionally been my least favorite ballet step. Because when you are first learning them they not only look stupid (like a cartoon frog, and I won't change my mind about that) but feel like the end times. I have very little bounce in my proverbial bungee, and petite allegro is basically my Achilles heel. Achilles ballet step? Something like that. As time has gone on I have thankfully progressed to a level where I am not asked to perform solid assemblés for ten minutes at a time, and a crappy assemblé is pretty easy to hide when it is only one of a string of disastrously crappy steps all crammed together in a petite allegro combination.
ANYWAY.
My new least favorite step to hate (my frenemy, you might say) is cabriole. Cabrioles, contrary to what their name seems to imply, are not small boxy sports cars, but a big and impressive grand allegro step wherein you throw yourself up in to a graceful leap and smack your feet together in the air before coming back down again. Cabrioles sure look exciting when they are well executed. But when I attempt them? Ridiculous. Aside from feeling like you are going to plunge to your death at any moment they also look like hell. I am sure I would improve at them if I spent some time practicing... which is really too bad, since I have mostly given up practicing every single thing. Ah, yes... that dedication business is all well and good, but apparently I can only keep it up for a year or two before burnout sets in. Hmm. Well, I am sure I will improve dramatically at SOMEthing. Drinking an entire bottle of water at one go, perhaps. Or walking past my neighbors in my ballet togs without feeling self-conscious.

I'm finally back to a full ballet schedule after the disaster that was my past month or so. Pointe class was sort of a wreck, but I will survive. No one says I have to be good at what I'm doing, after all!

New Year, 2015

So. The year happened. 2014, in the end, wasn't an incredibly great year for me but could have been worse. The year began with both of my cats coming down with terrible abscesses and needing emergency treatment. Thankfully the cat situation is mostly on an even keel, now. In the Spring there were absolute acres of recital costumes to fit, repair, and/or create. They turned out okay, and in exchange for my effort I have been taking class for free for several months (which, hoo boy, really helps right now). In the Summer I spent a lot of time worrying about a sick friend and driving back and forth to visit her in the hospital about two hours away from home. Nothin' proves devotion like watching someone have a catheter removed. In the Autumn I had oral surgery. In December my Dad had cataract surgery, it went well and I spent a few days dealing with that, then I had some traumatic family stuff to deal with. So far in 2015 I have had a miscarriage and had the locks on my car doors destroyed by someone with a screwdriver. It's actually better than last January, though? All in all I think my life is about as solid as it gets in the real world.

In my ballet world... meh. I suppose I improved on some things. To be honest ballet and I have been going through some rough times in our relationship. It's been physically really hard on me for a while (the last two weeks haven't been too bad, though) and I am not really wild about my class schedule. The back-to-back classes on Thursdays are so hard. So so hard. The worst part of the whole RA thing is the utter exhaustion, but I am not sure how much of this stamina issue I'm having is related to that and how much is just too many high-energy classes too close together. Regardless, feeling like you are going to keel over at any moment is not really encouraging and I have been feeling a lot less excited about going to class because of it. I'm working on it, but my enthusiasm isn't all that it could be.

This year I am going to actually try to do that damn ballet-related art project that I have been talking about for a solid year +. We'll see. I set up a blog for it last January. Haaaaaa. Yeah, way to go, RPrin, gettin' it done.

The Hardest Thing

Last night's 2.5 hour block of class was taught by a substitute instructor. She's a nice gal, one that often attends those classes herself, but is obviously a ballerina extraordinaire. Like, seriously ass-rockin'ly good. Does those one-footed relevés en pointe without so much as a twitch of difficulty while I laboriously haul myself up there using 10% muscle power and 90% barre. That sort of thing.
It's okay to have subs, but they do throw off your groove. You learn to expect a certain type of combination with a certain type of port de bras to a certain type of music and then BAM! Suddenly you are trying to figure out what the hell is going on and you haven't even made it past tendus at the barre, yet. And you spend the next hour+ sort of shaking your head and guessing and/or flailing around hoping you hit a ballet position of some sort by blind luck.
Anyway.
When we would universally botch the hell out of an entire combination this teacher would give us another shot at it (or torture us by making us repeat something we obviously can't figure out? You be the judge.) which meant we ended up doing quite a few things over and over again. After watching us glide gracelessly across the floor for the requisite bourées en pointe she stopped us with a question. "So. Who here loves doing bourées?" and everyone just sort of stood there, listening to the crickets chirp (honestly, I enjoy them more than most things en pointe, but after two hours of class there are few things in the world that I like). SO! "Okay, you are doing them again. AND I want to see those happy faces and softened arms. You're performing, guys! You can do this! Smile!"
I suppose we smiled. Or perhaps we just grimaced in a convincing approximation. 
I think smiling is probably the hardest thing about ballet.

Minor Improvements That Must be Fought For

Sometimes breakthroughs are exceptional. A moment of clarity and suddenly you are doing something you've never dreamed of.
But, let's face it, mostly you get tiny imperceptible improvements over the course of three solid months of work and the final product can really only justifiably be called "less bad than it was".
Take this petite allegro combination that the students have all come to dread. It's not even complicated, it's just glissades, jetés, and assemblés. But it's quick and it changes directions halfway through and pretty much everyone hates it. Last night, for the first time since we've been working on it (ages! Ages have been put in to this damn thing!) I watched myself in the mirror and felt like it wasn't pitiably terrible, just kind of a wreck. There was, perhaps, a slight bounce in my proverbial bungee. PERHAPS.

Also new: apparently the studio where I take ballet has been voted "best yoga studio" in the city. Which is interesting, I must say, because they don't actually offer any yoga classes. We all think they should accept the award and put it on the front desk just to mess with people.

Leg Mounts

I hate leg mounts. Leg mounts are those things where you grab your foot and try to développé it up over your head. You know... in a perfect world, with a perfect body. When I have to do them (in the real world, with an aging arthritic body that has only been dancing for three years) it's more like I grab a hold of whatever piece of leg I can and then hike it up to about 45* off the floor. Which isn't even as high as I can développé! But it's as high as I can stand to put the weight of my leg on my hands (legs are heavy! There must be like 20 pounds in a leg. No wait, I will look it up...okay so there are TWENTY SIX pounds in an average female leg! Yikes!) All that weight on my wrists (the first and most horribly sensitive bit of arthritis in my body) is impossible! It's why I stopped doing yoga. I used to be able to do shoulder stands and all kinds of ridiculousness, but NO WAY is that happening these days. My hands are my life, my ability to work. Screwing them up even more with no payoff just makes me angry!
Last night as I unsuccessfully hauled my leg up with my aching hand my teacher asked me if there was something wrong with me. Yes! Leg mounts are wrong with me! She said she should bring me a bungee to use. Which is the silliest freakin' mental image I have ever had. Strapping my ankle up in a bungee and hauling it up like a fish in a net...

Yeah, like that. Except not at all, even slightly.

Turning. Brain party.

Last night my pirouette from fifth at the barre (that is at least two awful things strung together. Pirouettes at the barre, AKA: smashing your knee in to a stationary hard object with force. AKA: if you had a REAL partner you would have just kneed him in the balls, way to go! PLUS pirouettes from fifth, which just suck.) was declared "awesome!"
Of course, it was only one out of six of the damn things, but I threw a little brain party, anyway. There was confetti raining down, and sparklers. I am pretty sure I heard a few noisemakers in the background, you know, along with all that cheering like the ball just dropped on New Year's Eve.

In the next class I discovered that it's not hard to turn en pointe. It's hard to STOP turning en pointe. If you use any force whatsoever you just... keep on going...

Level 1-2 visit

Since I have missed so much class I have a ton of make ups on the books that need to get used up before Summer starts and my life dissolves in the face of work. Last Friday I took the level 1-2 class that was my regular thing not so long ago. It's interesting, barre didn't seem as grueling as it did when I was in that class. It may be an actual change in the exercises, but perhaps I shall just seize this opportunity to say "oh wow, look at how far I have progressed".
They are doing different things, now. For example: I never did a pirouette until I started level 3, but they are working on them in 1-2 now. Probably wise, as I still struggle with them some days. Then again... would they have felt over-the-top difficult and insane and defeating two years ago? I think it's a strong possibility. I mean, it took a long time to nail down a lot of the things I take for granted now. When I started taking that class I basically had no foundation to build on, yet. Sure, I don't even have to think about how to do balancé (or pas de bourrée, or where to put my arm when I tendu to second... etc) these days, but it has been an uphill battle for those little victories (I'm not complaining, that is what ballet is all about). Pirouettes would maybe have killed me a little. Or I would now be amazing at them. You know. Either/or.
PS: in the past two months I have taken pointe twice, I think. And does it show? OH YES it does. I have lost so much strength in my legs that I'm shaking as soon as I get going. I guess this means I should get back on the old theraband and calf lifts train... blergh.

What What, in the Butt?

My level three class has a batch of new students, so the complexity of combinations has been stepped down a bit. Like, to the point that I actually feel competent. But my mixed-level class has only gotten harder and harder, so now I am stuck either feeling unchallenged or overly challenged. For cryin' out loud, can I get a level four class, please? These dead-dull en croix degages aren't doing it for me any more, and no matter how many times you tell me the sequence of a 13-step grand allegro combination it ain't gonna happen right now.
Sigh...

Sorry, I am feeling a bit shouty, tonight.
Because I... pulled my butt muscle? Or... something. Class was fuller than usual tonight so I got stuck at a portable barre which is a good foot or more higher than the lowest rung on the regular barre. So, when we were all supposed to hike our legs up on the barre... something went terribly wrong. I got through the rest of class but begged off pointe and came home early. If anything, it hurts worse NOW than it did in class.
Effing ballet, guys. What the hell?

PS: this has been a really butt-centric day for me. First thing in the morning I had to take one of my cats to the vet because she has a ruptured booty gland. Well, at least I don't have THAT.

PPS: Look. I am REALLY REALLY SORRY, this is in terrible taste, but I seriously have this song stuck in my head now, and I am sharing it with you because I am basically a bad person and I'm going to hell (and I want you to share in my pain):

Inspiration and Defeatism

Honestly, I had a really awful ballet week. I suppose there are just stretches of time in which you feel overwhelmed, unprepared, incompetent, and just plain lost. There are times like that in any pursuit, I suppose. Even in real life. I know there are days when I feel like I have no idea why I am considered so great at my job (brag brag) when holy crap, I have struggled all damn day to do something ridiculously easy. Eventually the feeling passes. Eventually you bang out a string of perfect buttonholes or land a double pirouette. But while you are feeling the slump there is very little you can say to yourself that sounds positive.   My teacher has been stepping up the complexity of our center work to the point that I now feel like I am utterly floundering and starting to question how I have spent the past year + in level three classes and still can't dance my way out of a sack...

Anyway. So that is how I have been feeling this week. Yesterday I ran across this post on a tumblr blog called Brilliant Broad. It was inspiring and I asked if I could share it with you guys, and she graciously agreed. I am going to let her post speak for itself:

Anyway, it reminded me of the good things about dancing and I needed that. Way to go, Brilliant Broad. Way to go all of us adult beginners and awkward/unlikely dancers. Long may we ronde de jambe.

I Don't Need No Stinkin' Splits

So. My teacher recently instituted a break between barre and center work where we are all supposed to stretch. Which sounds great, because I really miss the guided stretches at the end of my level 1-2 classes and have no self discipline so nothing ever gets stretched at home. But we are all supposed to be using this time to work on our splits. And I decided a few months back that A) There is basically no way in hell I am ever going to be able to accomplish the splits, and B) I am okay with that.
Now, hear me out.
I did try at it for a little while (okay, for a week or two back in November), because I was all inspired by other adult dancers and their splitty achievements. But... I realized it wasn't really a goal for me. A Goal with a capital G.
You know what I really want to be able to do? Fold in half. Like this:

 

from BalletUni

or like this:

from I Have No Idea Where. Let me know if you do.

It looks easy, but it's not! Try it! I (occasionally, you know, when I remember) work on this and I can get my hands flat against the floor but closing that distance between the chest and the legs is a lot harder than it looks at first blush.

To heck with your splits, man! I couldn't even do the splits when I was a kid. And I was a super flexible kid! I was one of those that can hook her feet behind her head FOR NO REASON KNOWN TO MAN. But still! No splits! In class tonight I actually heard (and FELT HOLY COW) something in my hip go TWANG! while doing these split-achieving stretches in class. Can't we do stretches at the barre? I am okay with stretches at the barre that make my parts go twang. But on the floor? ARGH.

Pre-pointe: how it went down

Okay, so pre-pointe class. How was it? Brutal. Stone. Cold. Brutal. But I lived to tell the tale! After a full 1 1/2 hour technique class I limped in to pre-pointe. It was pretty fun, actually. Lots of strength building. Relevés at the barre. Piqué arabesques. Chaînés. You get the picture. Lots of stuff where you are hanging out on your toes. Which is good, because I actually really enjoy that strengthening stuff. Whenever the teacher says "time for piqué roll downs" or "okay, put your leg up on the barre" everyone else groans and I go "awesome! Let's do this thing!". By the time we hit that last set of continuous relevés on one foot, though, I was ready to call it a DAY.
Today I feel it in my hips more than I had expected. Probably because I was focusing really hard on proper placement when we were at the barre. Holding turn-out properly and rising directly over my second and third toes rather than wobbling up there like (let's face it, ladies) we usually do.
Today I feel like I've been in some sort of accident, only I paid for the privilege and I'm raring to go back and do it again next week! Ballet, guys. It's hard.
I gotta tell you, though. Do not pick a fight with a ballet dancer. All that tininess and fragile grace is a total illusion. She can probably kill you with one swift kick in the junk.

Related: ballet class is probably the only place where someone you don't know very well can walk up to you and stroke your inner thigh and be like "that is great, RPrin!*" and it isn't even awkward at all.

*new abbreviation for this blog's title. Because it takes too long to type the whole thing and I am king lazy bones. Looks a little like a celebrity couple name, but I promise not to divorce myself so it's okay.

Saut de What*

22 students in class tonight! Good grief! Where did they all come from? It was the single largest class I have ever attended at this studio. We made do, but there was a certain amount of careful avoidance of other people's legs involved.
Tonight I finally nailed (once in a while, anyway) saut de basque. I've been struggling with it because apparently you can't teach me a damn thing without a certain amount of struggle. Which is nice, I guess, but seeing me successfully pull it off got my teacher back on the kick of encouraging me to perform. I don't really want to perform! I don't have a head for choreography. You can tell me a sequence of three steps and I will successfully only remember one and a half. Aside from being awkward and shy I simply don't really want to be on stage at this point in my life. That ship has sailed, honey. Let me make some new recital costumes or something, I am good at that.**

I would also like to say: Assemblé and cabrioles? A POX ON BOTH YOUR HOUSES!



*see what I did there? Eh? Eh?

**by which I mean that I did all of my struggling with it many years ago. College: it's awesome except that it isn't even at all. There is a lot of coffee involved and you cry a lot because you aren't perfect at everything. OR MAYBE THAT WAS JUST ME.

I'd Like to Thank the Little People. Oh Crap, Did I Already Use That Joke Title?

More compliments? They had better watch out or I might start, I dunno, believing them or something.
After mixed-level class tonight my teacher assured me that I had "improved dramatically".
Of course, when I started taking class a year and a half ago I could barely make it through pliés, so YES, there has been dramatic improvement. It just never feels like it when you are the only person in a room full of students that is doing a pirouette and everyone else is doing the thing they are actually supposed to be doing.
For example, during petite allegro tonight I was having one of those "I totally can't follow what the music is doing so I am just going to have to make it up as I go" moments. I have a lot of those moments. I came away from class with this thoroughly stuck in my head:

What can I say, Dad played me a lot of 60's music when I was a kid.

Alliterative Reflections After Class

You know you're an adult ballet student/arthritic old lady when... you find yourself saying "you know what I'd really like for an anniversary present, honey? Compression socks"

After class last night a couple of people told me that I had improved a lot in the last couple of months. One of the compliment fairies (like tooth fairies? Only they bring you compliments instead of taking teeth?) was our perpetually perfect, pretty, and perky (puhpuhpuhpuh) teenager who always kicks all our old asses out there on the floor. It was nice but seemed really strange. I always feel a bit like the class I am in is the hardest class I have ever taken, you know? Like... maybe I'm getting worse. Or more tired. Or for some reason I just haven't got the mojo working this time. But then the next class comes along and I feel the EXACT SAME WAY. I think the rush of endorphins dulls your memory.

Popped Ballon

Right now petite allegro and I are not getting along. Okay. No. I should say "Petite allegro is killing me."
It is sucking the very soul from my tiny, withered husk.
I see my little improvements in other things. I can do double frappes, now. I have mostly figured out the front, back, side, front (whatever the hell that is called) pattern for barre work. I try to keep my spirits up with this stuff. But petite allegro. Man. It's so defeating.
Don't get me wrong, I'm fine with the component parts. I can do glissades and assemblés (patooie!). Pas de chats and jetés. But... at the kind of tempo I am being asked for I can basically just trip over myself repeatedly. I just sort of flail around randomly and try not to run in to anyone until the music is over and I get to stop. Apparently we are supposed to be aiming for "ballon" which is basically a fancy French way of saying "you don't hit the ground like an elephant" but right now I can't even get myself OFF the ground in the first place. I kind of look like I'm doing a very confused tap dance for a minute or two. A little soft shoe routine.
Ra-ta-ta-ta-TA!

Challenge Accepted

If nothing else the adult ballet blogging community keeps me motivated (this blog included). I am wretched at self-discipline. I basically have none. I have to trick myself in to keeping up with classes twice a week by paying in advance when I am not thinking about it. Oops! Nope! I already paid! I have to go! So, keeping up with doing pilates once a week and convincing myself to get down on the floor and stretch once a day has been ... well. I won't say it's been a challenge, because that would imply that I've been winning or overcoming or something. Honestly I've been pretty dreadful about it all.
One of the blogs I keep up with is written by an adult dancer who keeps making me feel awfully lazy about not getting my self-improvement on. I'm feeling terribly inspired by her 30 day challenges to herself and so I think I will steal the concept for the next month and attempt to work seriously and with focus on the little and annoying things I really need to improve. Balances and building up strength in my core/ab muscles, feet, and legs. I have been working on it here and there, but I forget about it more often than not. Perhaps having a goal and deadline in sight will encourage me to actually get on with it. There is nothing harder for me than trying to self-motivate for an inarticulate and foggy future purpose.

In ballet class news: we started doing cabrioles. Which is the name of a small model car from the 80s or something, isn't it? My spell checker informs me that, no, it was cabriolet. Well, fine then. Never mind. Cabrioles, on the other hand, are not anything like as easy as you would think. Also: stupidly painful with shin splints! There are days when I just can't figure out why I took up ballet. There is so much jumping! I should have taken a country line dancing class or something...

OKAY YOU KNOW WHAT? NEVER MIND. BALLET IS BEAUTIFUL.

Sigh...

I Feel Like I Am Perpetually Starting New Classes

So, guess what I am going to do this week? Take the level 3-5 class instead of my 1-2 class on Thursday. I'm a little nervous about it. My shin splints are still bothering me, and I overdid it a little tonight in an attempt to do a few gentle jumps that turned out to be a terrible idea. They are getting better, sloooooowly, but it will probably be a while before I'm back up to speed. I was going to wait until I hit that magical and halcyon day when I felt competent in level 3, but that day, sadly, will probably never arrive. Because I never really felt competent in level 1-2, either. I begin to believe there is no such thing as feeling competent.
Anyway, so I asked my teacher if I should wait for a while or if I should just go ahead and advance. And she said I should go ahead and advance because "you want to do pointe, right?" at which point (ha) I thought to myself oh geeze, do I? I mean for realios? Like... do all the hard work and suffer through the stupid painful parts for the sake of looking a little like I have GOAT HOOVES? 
This is not a new line of thought. In fact, I am often seized by this exact same feeling when presented with any opportunity that looks like it's going to require work. You know. Effort and time and inconvenience. I'm nearly convinced that I would be a famous runway designer right now if I had any ambition whatsoever. But, I don't, and so I neglect opportunities when they knock. They've been trying for YEARS to get me to advance at the theater to a more interesting position. But... then I would have to work six days a week, and wouldn't even earn overtime when I have to put in 11 hour days?
Sigh...
Anyway, the answer is yes. Yes I do want to prance around with goat feet for a while, just to see what it's like. Five-year-old Me would never forgive me if I didn't. It might suck, who knows. And yes, I will even go to the extreme of feeling like the clumsy new girl for the rest of my life in order to continue doing something I enjoy. I will advance much faster and nail the tricky stuff with much less flailing about if I can focus on it more than once a week.

Also, just FYI: tonight's level 3 class wasn't half bad ( "it ain't half good, either" as I always think to myself when I feel like quoting Pinky and the Brain) I actually managed to not get all that lost on the funny barre combinations we always seem to do. The ones where instead of doing everything en croix we do some crazy switcheroo and start using our inside leg at what appears to be a totally random point. I think it was explained better this time, to be honest. But, I claim this victory in the name of getting my lazy ass to Thursday class, anyway.

A Flickin' and a Flackin'

Flic flacs make me feel like a particularly untalented show horse. The kind that will probably be retired early and may or may not be turned in to glue at a young age. Flic flac. Even the name is silly! FLICK! FLACK!
I just don't know.
But don't fret, she promises. Oh no! Because next up we are making these babies do complete turns IN CENTER.
Sigh.
I would post an explanatory youtube video for those unfamiliar with the term, but I can't find any that look nearly as awkward as I feel while doing them. It's like this: we start out doing pas de chevals (which make you look like a horse too but it's okay because at least they put that in the title, right?) and then you throw your foot out to the side, then... whack it across the floor in front of you while you rise up on the other foot... and then some magic supposedly happens in which you turn around and smack your foot on the ground again. Yay. The elegance of la danse, non?
I can just about do it on the right side, but the left is ridiculous. And in reverse? Not even happening.
I have to take a certain amount of comfort in knowing that at this time last year I was utterly perplexed by preparation for ronde de jambes and now it ain't no thang. And think of how much better my chassé/sauté arabesques are now than when I first attempted them back in September. Rome wasn't built in a day.

The Apathy Patrol

So I was dreading going away for a long time because I knew that when I came back home and once again faced going to class twice a week I would have to deal with my old enemy: complete apathy. It's just that... when I am dancing a lot then I want to dance a lot. But if I'm not? Then... I would just rather sit at home and eat smarties and watch Mythbusters. When I get back in to it it will be fine, but until then I know that it's going to be hard, and hurt, and make me all sweaty, and I will probably get a migraine afterward. And I'll  have to sit around with ice packs all over my body when I get home. And I have to drive ten miles to the studio through rush hour/Christmas shopping traffic and/or take the train through the ghetto in the dark. And. And. And. The point is that my brain is telling me it would rather just stay home if it's going to be so much trouble to go to class.
But. Tonight I am back home (may be gone again next week, but only time will tell) and, like a good girl, I went to class. That would be my level 3 class, by the way. In case you were wondering how badass I am. I answer is: totally. I am totally badass.
Class... kicked my butt. Pretty much. I can definitely feel the fact that I didn't do anything for three weeks. Well, that's not true. I shoveled snow. Was it hard work? Yes. Did it help me remain in ballet-condition? Not even a little bit.
I had to learn how to stand again, and where my feet are supposed to go. And then I flailed around badly for a while while we attempted combinations that I had never seen before. Also, apparently, while I was away they started some new stuff. So I just had to fake it through those parts. HA. Did I mention how badass I am? Because it's a lot. It did put me in mind, though, of that time in elementary school when I was out sick while they taught the whole class the multiplication table and then when I got back no one noticed and so I spent the next two years trying to learn how to multiply and divide ALL BY MY SELF. Ahem. But, you know, with enveloppe* at the barre instead of actually important stuff.
Not that I am bitter or anything.

*I'm sure enveloppe should have an accent mark in there somewhere. But I'll be darned if I can actually find it online.

Hippo Birdy Two Ewes

I turned 29 years and 24 months old today. Yay? I held off on posting this because I had plans to make pink cupcakes with pink frosting and a pink candle and eat one while wearing a pink frilly thing but my cupcakes turned out ... well... horrible. My ballerina dreams were dashed on the rocks of artificial strawberry flavoring and being too lazy to use a piping bag with a star tip. So, you don't get to see them regardless of how pink they are, sorry!

Anyway.

I feel like I am starting to get the hang of this double frappé business. I'm not saying I'm whipping them out like it ain't no thang. It's a thang. Trust me. And they are still kind of confused. But, at least I am not totally randomly flailing around for the entire combination. Small steps. Small steps.
Head lines are confusing me to death, though. I KNOW which way I should be looking while my foot is in a particular position... I just can't actually hook those things up together, yet. At least not in rapid progression. Left, front, right, front... bam bam bam. Forget it!
Other things to work on: not tipping over during chaînés turns, not deflating halfway through adagio, not getting migraines after every single class.