The Road Goes Ever On

Part: Follow
Dances: TBD
Hovers: 0

It's been about 3 weeks since I last posted, so I figured that this blog at least deserves some small word by way of an update. Certain things, I believe, are beyond the scope of this blog, perhaps a bit too personal in nature to bring too much to the fore, but suffice it to say that our partnership here has experienced one of the most difficult phases so far. Changing goals and priorities not shared by both parties understandably produce strain, and those new priorities and lack of common motivation have definitely impeded our heretofore practice and training routine.

While I don't think it fair of me to make a lot of public judgments about where my partner is with all of this, except as it relates directly to me, I think I ought to add that I have been continuing to practice on my own almost daily (somewhat half-heartedly, I admit). I also have taken a few lessons solo, which is a good thing for me to do anyways since I have a lot of problem areas to work on in my dancing that Jeff really shouldn't have to bother with. In any case, I am really ready to get back to serious practice, and while our busy schedules and perhaps more balanced lives will not allow for the much more generous commitment to practice and training that we had in the beginning, I believe that if we wish to continue dancing together and pursuing a common goal, we must do something consistently. Since I communicated my feelings about this to Jeff, he agreed that we ought to resume our practice sessions soon in some form, so tentatively we are planning to practice at least weekly starting the week after the Aria Ballroom student showcase. Jeff is busy preparing his own students for the showcase, or recital, as it were, and meanwhile I'm practicing our gold waltz routine with another student who is in the youth program at Aria but also is old enough now to compete in the adult category. This particular student is a better dancer than I, and a perfect height match for me at 6'1" tall, so we're having fun putting this together, throwing in a couple of open level figures just for fun. Oversways and developes just make me happy, and Jeff hasn't wanted to touch them with a ten foot pole yet, so I'm having fun playing around and probably looking ridiculous. My bad balance is definitely becoming more apparent, as I don't have Jeff's solidity to counter-balance my craziness here. It's good practice for me though.

There was talk of Jeff and I performing a social style dance for the showcase, lead and follow style, but I haven't been able to nail that one down. Nightclub 2-step or bolero would probably be the dance, if it ends up happening. I guess you'll just have to come to the showcase this Saturday to find out!

Update

In case anyone actually still reads this blog, first, I am sorry for the cease fire on posts! The last post, cryptic and short as it was, really gets to the heart of the matter, but the down shot is that Jeff and I are taking a bit of a break from partnered practice. About a month ago I needed a week or two or so off to regroup, get sleep, and get myself back into a normal state of mental well-being, but after those two weeks Jeff himself felt like he needed a bit more time to sort some things out in his own personal life. So while I am, of course, dying to get back to practice, I have to make sure he has some space to work through everything. In the mean time, to keep myself from getting depressed and going crazy, I've taken a couple of lessons with Simeon (very helpful), practiced a bit on my own, and gone out social dancing. I also recently was offered and accepted a new job, and so will be starting a new position in downtown Seattle in the middle of next month, which I am very excited about. Part of my stress in the past month was related to the interview, application process, and general excitement surrounding it, so now that I have the position and I have a better sense of what my career is going to look like going forward, I am feeling much better about it all.

When we will resume is really up in the air at this point. While there is no doubt I miss it a great deal, I am trying very hard not to let anything get in the way of my enthusiasm and love for the dancing. It's actually been very tough for me lately, so I just keep stepping back, looking at the big picture, and refocusing on what it is that brings me joy.

In the words of Oscar Wilde...

"It is better to have a permanent income than to be fascinating."

Onward

Part: Follow

Dances: Foxtrot, Waltz, Nightclub 2-step

Hovers: 0

After our bit of a breakdown last week, and then an actual break while I was out of town for a family wedding over the weekend, we got back to practice again last night. Based on everything that came out last week, I realized that while motivation in certain regards is wearing thin, we have to have a plan for what we're doing or we'll get nowhere and make no progress. I think, as with anything, you can reach a point where without pushing extra hard and getting more training, you aren't going to progress much, if at all. However, as with most things, I think that maintaining a certain level of performance requires regular practice and attention. I've certainly found that to be true with music, and as evidence, I can play piano no where near the level I used to when I was practicing daily, or even weekly. I think dance is no different, and I see Jeff and I at least trying to maintain our current skills, and, using our natural analytical abilities and the knowledge we do have, trying to make some progress, no matter how little. And to that purpose, I'm planning to be more assiduous about planning and thinking ahead about each practice, pinpointing areas we need to hammer out and to help us achieve some focus.

Monday, I suggested we work on foxtrot, in particular our CBM and especially on the reverse turns, where it is crucial to making the rotation work without knocking the partnership off balance. We had some really nice turns, some with turn amounts in a range of degrees, and it was nice to feel the entrance and exits being relatively consistent in terms of our frame and connection. That was good. Jeff also commented that our feather step is "not too bad." I think he's probably right; Kora did say during a lesson once that was one of the best parts of our foxtrot, which is quite a compliment given that it's the most critical and perhaps most difficult figure to execute properly in the dance. Jeff did mention, however, that he feels like he's being dragged along. I find that odd, because whenever he stops, I'm not ahead of him and stop in the same place, and I don't think I'm really back weighted. In fact, I feel very forward in foxtrot, almost to a fault, but I do swing my legs out a lot from the hip and push from the standing leg pretty strongly. I'll have to think about it some more to see what could be causing it. At the same time, I have to wonder if that's such a bad thing, that when he puts the foot on the gas I just go. Probably most of the other ladies he dances with don't...he pushes them around, which in some ways is a less scary and dangerous feeling for a lead, maybe more comfortable, even. But then it's not like I always know what steps he is going to dance either and he tests that often, so I don't think I'm back leading in that way. Hmm...

We ended with nightclub 2-step and the Beegie Adair Moon River waltz. I love those two dances very much. In fact, I love dancing in general so much, that, as I was telling Jeff recently, I truly look forward to it every day, no matter if we're just doing metronome quickstep practice or something kill-joy like that. That is why quitting practice for a while did not sound like a "logical solution" to my problems last week. Maybe I wouldn't enjoy it so much if I was doing it for a living, but right now I kind of envy those who do. Jeff is on the other side of the coin now though as a teacher and studio owner, so to some degree I realize that is hard for him to feel same way about it. Losing most of our relatively short practice time can be a much bigger let down for me because it's my one chance to do this thing I love all day, while for Jeff it's like, the tenth time he gets to do it in a day. I get that. So we just have to figure out how to work with each other on this; Jeff is mostly leaving it to me to figure out what I want us to get out of practice and have me plan that out, since at this point without the direction of lessons, he's hard put to it to muster up the motivation to get excited about working on the same old problems day in and day out. And that's where I come in; I get to be the slave driver. Yay. But I guess somebody has to do it.