I'm not dead, but I might have killed all of your future offspring.

If I had had the time to write a post this morning, this is what it would have read:

"I just found out five minutes ago that I'm starting rehearsals for a pas de deux today, and that's awesome. Except..... I'm still out of shape from the holidays. Out of shape to the point where I can't call In Shape on my cell phone because the long-distance charges would be astronomical. I've been on my pointe shoes maybe twice in the last two weeks. Shitshitshitshitshit. If I do not post later tonight, that means I am dead. Of embarassment. At my own lame-ness. If that happens, someone please take care of my critters. I'd bequeath you my money, but... the economy = I don't have any. Check you later, wish me luck, okaythanksbye."

"Um, wow.... M. Butterfly, you're quite the Nervous Nellie aren't you?" Yeah, it's a habit. But it works for me, because here I am six hours later (clearly quite alive) after a lovely & dancey day.

I kicked things off with a ballet barre at the studio by my house (where E informed me that oh, hey, you and R and dancing a duet! Today!). M was also there, and she told me she reads this site and that it rocks. Whee! Thanks, M!

Rehearsal was cool. The first hour and a half was mostly focused on the trio, but there was still much floor-sliding and shoulder-standing and face-standing to be done (What else can you call that thing other than a "side- of- the- face stand?").
I expected pas de deux rehearsal to be ninety minutes of me being a bumbling klutz, but it went pretty well. I mean, there were Moments: You know, the kind of Moments that happen when you've been on a messed-up dancing schedule for three weeks and the kind that happen early in the process of guys + gals + the medium of contemporary pas de deux.* Allow me to elaborate thus:
Friend: "Hey, how was work?"
Me: "Oh, it was pretty cool. We're working on a new project, and I spent the last hour exploring ways to stomp on someone's Man-Junk. You?"

I'm back to dancing alldayeveryday, I completed three dances in the last four days, I'm in an awesome ballet, and I'm doing a pas that is going to be damn fun (now that I'm past my initial anxiety about my own abilities). Things are pretty sweet over here.

*I'm just saying that it's irony on a base level that "The Nutcracker" is the most widely-known ballet in the world.