This boot needs to come off tomorrow.

Just sayin'...

  

leaving is not enough; you must
stay gone. train your heart 
like a dog. change the locks
even on the house he’s never
visited. you lucky, lucky girl. 
you have an apartment 
just your size. a bathtub
full of tea. a heart the size 
of Arizona, but not nearly
so arid. don’t wish away 
your cracked past, your 
crooked toes, your problems
are papier mache puppets
you made or bought because the vendor
at the market was so compelling you just
had to have them. you had to have him.
and you did. and now you pull down 
the bridge between your houses,
you make him call before 
he visits, you take a lover
for granted, you take 
a lover who looks at you
like maybe you are magic. make
the first bottle you consume
in this place a relic. place it 
on whatever altar you fashion
with a knife and five cranberries.
don’t lose too much weight.
stupid girls are always trying 
to disappear as revenge. and you 
are not stupid. you loved a man
with more hands than a parade 
of beggars, and here you stand. heart
like a four-poster bed. heart like a canvas. 
heart leaking something so strong 
they can smell it in the street.

Marty McConnell, “Frida Kahlo to Marty McConnell

"I have no desire to prove anything by dancing. I have never used it as an outlet or a means of expressing myself. I just dance. I just put my feet in the air and move them around." -Fred Astaire

"In heaven, all the interesting people are missing." 
— Friedrich Nietzsche

XD

Somehow this reminds me of Elijah....

Fun Fun Fun

So.

I'm back in my boot/on crutches for two more weeks, so probably no Nutcracker for me this year :( My dad drove up to Sac yesterday to bring me my mom's car which she's loaning me for the next few weeks though.  I have awesome parents.

I'm getting my wisdom teeth pulled tomorrow.  I figured I'm not dancing so I might as well put myself in more pain :) Yay smoothies and pain killers!

At this point I'll probably come down to LA after Thanksgiving because (hopefully) I get to start dancing again December 1st, and I definitely want to be home for my first week of dancing.  I love the classes here but I know I'm going to push myself too hard if I try to get back into shape here.

Anyway, that's all my fun news.  As always, I loved my SBB phone call on Thursday...even if I had no idea what was going on half the time :D

By the way, crutches are absolutely ridiculous.

xoxo

"Listen, baby, people do funny things.  Specially us.  The cards are stacked against us and just trying to stay in the game, stay alive and in the game, makes us do funny things.  Things we can't help.  Things that make us hurt one another.  We don't even know why.  But look here, don't carry it inside and don't give it to nobody else.  Try to understand it, but if you can't, just forget it and keep yourself strong, man."


~Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison

Obsession Station

So, thanks to having regular broadcast television for the first few weeks I was here and Justin's obsession, I've been watching way too much of "How I Met Your Mother."  Not that I'm complaining about that....

Really, it's hilarious.

Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worse kind of suffering.

– Paulo Coelho (via quote-book)

Forget men with money, go for men with music.

~Betty Bop 

LIFE GOALS

I'm bored/oddly motivated.

1. Become a professional ballet dancer :D
2. Go to college.
3. Live in a foreign country.
4. Live in New York City.
5. Be on Broadway?

To be continued...

Whoops :D

So, it's been a while.

I'll work in chronological order:

Halloween: I went as Madeline. John, Biber, and I went to Mary's for a bit before picking up Rex, Isha, Kelly and Oliver (our new Brit) and then the seven of us went to Ron and Carinne's for the company Halloween Party. The whole company was there (and then some) and, most importantly, there was a ton of food! The costumes were great; our teacher Nolan T'sani was the Pope, Alysia was the Chaquita Banana lady, Lauryn was Twiggy, Isha and Meghan (a new girl from the Pittsburgh Ballet Theater trainee program) were Audrey Hepburn, Rex was La Roux, etc. Basically, we had fun. There are pictures, go stalk on Facebook :D

On a less fun note, Monday my foot was hurting as badly as it did two weeks ago (I couldn't balance on it) and Tuesday it was super swollen after barre. I called my doctor from Torrance and described it to him and he told me to see the doctor he referred me to within 24 hours and to put my boot back on. The next day I went and got x-rays, and from what I understand the bone is in 3 parts but the doctor didn't make that sound like a huge deal so I don't really know what's going on. I haven't danced since Tuesday and I'm back in the boot. I have an MRI scheduled for Monday, so hopefully I'll know more after that. Hopefully it'll be fine...

Fingers crossed everyone.

xoxo

Halloween

Oh, and I think a couple other girls and I are going to be Disney princesses....I'll probably be Jasmine or Tiana :D

Nutz

Yay Nutcracker!

But actually.  I love Nutcracker.  Today, however, was rough.  I was kinda tired, and it was my first full day of pointe. Yikes.  I was off in class and then I had rehearsal pretty much all day until 7:00.  As in I didn't leave the studio until 7:00.  Waltz rehearsal was a disaster.  I did the whole thing on pointe and my foot/feet/entire body was absolutely killing me...

Yeah, pointe sucks ass.  Especially after three months.

Time to ice bath now.  Joy.

Ice baths suck ass too.

Oh, and I have to wake up at 5:00 tomorrow morning.  But Alysia's giving me a ride to work!  And I really do love Nutcracker! 

P.S. I get to wear yellow for Waltz :D  That news might have been the best part of my day :D

Friends

This I need too...I love Friends! And it's so hard to find online!

Speaking kind of of friends, I'm starting to grow used to being alone.  My past two days off from Sac Ballet I worked for 5 hrs at Noah's and other than that just talked to my friends and family on the phone and did things by myself.   Like working on college apps.  Yeah, that's happening again.  I'm really leaning toward going to college next year, but I can't quite figure out why I want to go.  And I haven't really been here long enough to make a well-informed decision...Anyway, the point is that like three months ago I couldn't handle being along even when I was in the same house as other people, and now I'm finally becoming comfortable with being alone.  It's nice. XD

P.S. Any ideas for what I should be for Halloween?

Singin in the Rain

I can't believe I waited so long to watch this movie.  I neeeeeeeeeeeed to watch/own it!

Dance

“ The dance is strong magic. The dance is a spirit. It turns the body to liquid steel. It makes it vibrate like a guitar. The body can fly without wings. It can sing without voice. The dance is strong magic. The dance is life.” -Pearl Primus ”

Good Morning, Sunshine!

So....

This weekend was fun.  Friday night our show went really well except for a couple of technical issues with the music.  The dancers handled it really well though.  After the show we had a cast party-ish thing at a restaurant/brewery next to the theater with Ron, Carineen, the dancers, and a bunch of benefactors.  Then the dancers went over to Mary's, a karaoke bar next door to the studio, which we stayed at until it closed :D Then we went over the Quarum, which is the apartment complex most of the dancers are staying at.  We had fun.

Yesterday was my first day at Noah's!  I worked the closing shift though so I mostly just cleaned (ugh).  Today I  went in from 6 to 10:30.  The sun's not even up that early.  I'm only supposed to work 6-9 (because company class is usually at 9:30) but I had the day off from ballet today so I stayed later (more moneyyyyyyy!).  The good news is that I'll pretty much never need to buy bread again; I think I have like 10 bagels in my apartment right now.  That's only from two days of work!  Anyone want some mailed to them? Everyone there seems pretty chill, and Alysia was working there with me today so it wasn't so bad.

I loved my SBB phone call yesterday :D Thanks!  It was so good to hear from everyone!

xoxo

Hot Hot Hot!

I've been here in Sacramento for two weeks today (and ^ it's hot here)!

Tomorrow is one of two of our Capital Choreography Competition performances--I'm not in it (ahem, broken foot) but I'm handing out programs and collecting the audience's votes so I get to watch for free :D  Basically three choreographers (Melissa Barak of LA Ballet, Darrell Grand Moultrie, and Yannis Adoniou) choreographed pieces on Sacramento Ballet dancers and both the audience and five judges pick the best piece.  I absolutely love Darrell and his piece; the music is amazing, the choreography's awesome, and his personality seems great to work with.  Even cleaning his piece didn't seem tedious at all.  I wasn't here when he set it, but he came back this week to clean it and put in an understudy (Amanda's injured) and the first time we met one of my new favorite stories.

He comes into the studio to clean his piece, and, since I can't really understudy I was just stretching on the side of the floor.  After ten or fifteen minutes he noticed that I was there and looked at Carinne and said, "Who's that, a new girl?"  Carinne introduced me, and he said, "Wow, I looked over there, and I was just like, 'oooooo yes black girl!'" I started laughing.  He asked me what nationality I was and when I said, "Chinese and....white," the entire studio started laughing.  He just looked at me with a confused look on his face and then said, "Well, here, being Chinese is like being black.  You're black."

EVYN HOW JEALOUS ARE YOU?

That episode pretty much made my life.  I'm now the official black baby of the company :D

The other pieces are very good too, but they don't seem to be as energetic as Darrell's, though Chloe and Stefan have a gorgeous pas de deux in Melissa's piece.

Our next show after the CCC is a Family Fun show which I'm also not in (sigh) but I have to walk around in costume any way.  I think I'm going to be a duck. It'll be cute?

Since I couldn't dance much and therefore couldn't really understudy I asked if there was anything I could do to be more helpful.  I did a little busywork (stuffing letters, making flyers, etc.) but I've made pretty good friends with the Costume Mistress (who's married to our Doctor) so I've been doing some sewing too.

My foot was good enough for me to do everything but jumps today with some pain, but I really think it's getting better!  It's been nice feel like I'm actually dancing again.

I've made pretty good friends with John and the other Trainees/Apprentices.  John and Alex B. filled me in on a lot of the company drama from the past couple seasons today.  I guess some things never change...

That's really all I can think of for now...Post a comment if I forgot anything!

xoxo

Numero Uno

So I'm way behind on this blogging thing...sorry Cam!

I guess I'll start with people:

Ron and Carinne: Husband and Wife; Directors of the Sacramento Ballet.  Ron's really nice and is trying to make sure I don't hurt myself more/again.  Carinne runs most rehearsals and is amazing at cleaning pieces--she notices everything.  She kind of reminds me of Alicia and Diane combined.

Lynlee: Ballet Mistress; she was mentored by Robert Kelly! And used to dance with Sac Ballet.

Alysia: the other Trainee; SUNY Purchase Alum 

Lauryn: Apprentice; she was at Cincinnati Ballet with Charlotte last year.

Katie: Apprentice; she looks kind of like Lizzie.

Kelly: Apprentice

Alex B: Apprentice; his friends nicknamed him "Superqueer."

John: I think he's a full company member.  He trained at Crockett-Deane Ballet so he went to RDA and did IBC  in 2006.  He's really nice and funny and gay.

Alex S.: I don't know him well yet but I think he's a Trainee.  He's the only other eighteen-year-old in the company and seems nice.

Roy: company member from Shanghai.  He's pretty quiet, but contributes to the Asian Invasion of the Sacramento Ballet.

Sunchai: company member from LONG BEACH! He's always the comedic relief in class and rehearsal.

Alex C.: Ron and Carinne's daughter.  She's also a full company member but they really don't give her any special favor.  She's really nice and an absolutely beautiful dancer.  She also trained at Crockett-Deane, so she went to RDA and everything.  She even went to the one at SBB (my first one)!

Rick: Alex B. nicknamed him the BAG (Big Angry Giant). He's from Australia and is super tall with lots of tattoos.  He comes off as disrespectful sometimes but he's a good dancer.  I stand behind him at the barre everyday he's there, which means I can never see myself in the mirror :)

Chloe: full company member; absolutely GORGEOUS dancer with absolutely no diva complex.  She's the sweetest person ever.  She's 22 and her husband (!) comes to the studio to watch rehearsal when he's not at chef school or something.  I think his name's Josiah?

Amanda: also a beautiful company member.  She's hurt right now though so they had to put her understudies in for the next show. I'm fairly certain she and Rick are dating

Chris: full company member.  He showed us his dance to the Golden Girls song today :) He went to Indiana U.  He does the coolest lift thing with Chloe in our next show where she's draped across his back or something and then he rolls to the ground with her.  I still don't get it but it looks really cool.

Rob: full company member.  He reminds me of Angel from Rent.  He's beautiful and super sweet and has the most adorable dog named Paco.  He and Chris are dating.

Ava: full company member who's kind of like Helena; all limbs. She must be almost six foot.  (Sarah, she looks like Paige.)  She also graduated from Indiana U.  She's the only new female company member this year.

Brick: full company member. She's been with the company for 7 years and is fierce!

Isha: another full company member and Asian! She's beautiful.

Richie: another Australian.  He reminds me of Sasha Radetsky with more hyperextended legs and probably a better dancer.  He pronounces "fuck" as "fack" which I find hilarious.

Rex: our resident Englishman.  He's also new this season and is silly and funny and really good.  He's really good friends with Kelly and has red moonboots!

Stephan: another Indiana U graduate.  He's funny and nice but I think one of the older dancers.  He usually partners with Chloe and they look absolutely breathtaking together.  I forgot what I was doing because I was watching them.

I think that's everyone? Anyway, this past week has been kind of frustrating because I still can't really dance; it's only been two weeks since I got my boot off.  I still haven't been en pointe really and I can't jump yet.  I get free physical therapy but I haven't taken any x-rays for 5 weeks I think.  I'm just scared I'm going to break my sesamoid again; if I do that means I have to have surgery to remove the bone fragments because it won't heal next time :(  It's been kind of tempermental; one day it'll be good enough to turn on and the next i can barely grande-plie.  

More tomorrow!

xoxo

From the hell that was senior year:


"OK so moral of the story: we're both fucked for life but we're gonna do it anyway and if we play our cards right it might even turn out to be fantastic and if it doesn't we're done in a few decades anyway.  So in the meantime we might as well enjoy it, yeah?"


-Dylan

‎"Stifling an urge to dance is bad for your health--it rusts your spirit and your hips." -Adabella Radici