It was both wonderful and stressful. Saturday was a haze of stress, freakouts, and trying to sleep. The show was amazing – one of the best shows I’ve seen so far. Sunday, when things were settled, I took workshops the entire day. I got a lot out of all my workshops, especially Melina’s Flamenco workshop, completely rocking out at the end.

The after party was hilarious, and there is no way I’m going to put any of that down in print.

So now it’s training time. I have my training schedule at Krav Maga plus old school tri training, my old tri diet, and my choreography ready. I figure I have just over a month for learning and conditioning, then a month for polish. I did combat training today, and I’m heading back for Thai Pad and Crossfit tonight. Dammit, I’m going to look like a fitness model again, and I’m going to nail this tough choreography.

This blog is going to undergo a bit of revision also – this will now be a dance/training only space. I am registering spiralmaker.com to document my crafty experiments, which really deserve their own space.

This one has been ravaged by an illness I didn’t know I had, and an injury that nearly took my life. This one is twenty pounds heavier than before my illness. This one hurts constantly, and needs to be stretched every day to retain mobility. This one now has arthritis, and auto-immune reactions. This one is slower, more painful, and less adaptable than the last version, and some joints don’t work reliably any more. This one has been scarred, beat up, burned, degenerated, starved, dehydrated, and nearly destroyed twice in 33 years.

But it’s still strong.  And it will heal.

It wasn’t easy. Learning to stay stationary and entertaining was hard. Dealing with nerves was harder. But the biggest victory was that I looked wonderfully relaxed in the video, and like I was having fun.

And I actually *was*.

It was a great experience. The musicians were wonderful, and the whole show was incredibly entertaining. More importantly, I was able to keep myself relaxed enough to joke around with the audience and have some fun with interpretation. I am eagerly awaiting my teacher’s feedback on the video. I’m pretty happy with what I did, but we’l see what the experts have to say.

Additionally, Krav Maga is seriously rocking this summer. With the addition of early morning classes and the Fit to Fight program, I’m in kicky pow heaven.

Corn is really the most annoying vegetable ever to grow. EVERYTHING eats it. I may try to use diatomaceous earth next year, and if that doesn’t work, I may just pack it in and leave that crop to the pros. Seeing beetles, tiny worms, BIG worms, and (blech) earwigs every time I pull off an ear makes me never want to grow it again. Seriously – earwigs in corn? EW.

What IS doing well is my herb garden, melons, berries, and the tropicals. The bees have banded together and decided that I do not belong in the herb garden for now, but once I’m allowed in there again, I think I may move out the larger floral herbs into the flower garden. The blue vervain and rose bergamot have reached bush size and are eating my other herbs.

The honeydew has taken over half the middle long bed. It’s ridiculous. The blackberries have gone from being a half dead stick in my container garden to multi-tentacled monsters. I actually have to think of building a structure to throw the blackberries over for next year. Maybe an A-frame?

Malabar spinach is a voracious grower and very tasty, so I get to have a bug-free bumper crop of spinach-like substance in the middle of the summer. I have lost zero spinach to bugs or bunnies, so this friendly climber will be a permanent resident.

The evil vole living in my garden continues to gnaw on melons, squash, and whatever he can get his grubby little paws on. I am soaking everything in castor oil, which seems to keep him at bay most of the time, but other times I see him scrabbling around and making faces at me. I would really like to find my slingshot and take up some target practice, since the little shithead seems to ignore both the castor oil and fox urine I sprinkle around the perimeter. I guess my cantaloupes are just that tasty.

I missed the first half of the second workshop because, like a dummy, I left my costumes and makeup at home. I got there when the class was doing an expression exercise with a simple choreography. That turned into a challenging choreography, which I unfortunately had to sit out halfway through and just take notes (I must remember to bring more food to workshops).

There were lots of little bits and pieces I took away from this one, but the thing that stuck with me the most was seeing another girl go through the same panic at having to emote that I did. She led us in the emoting section, and kept getting frustrated when she couldn’t remember the choreography. She finally broke down, and said that she felt like she was letting us down because she couldn’t remember it. I  deeply sympathized with her, and it was extremely difficult seeing someone go through the same things that I personally felt. I offered to lead, and joked around that we would do something only vaguely like the choreography, hoping to put her at ease. She seemed to recover a bit, and did a pretty solo at the hafla later.

The hafla was great! Ali was as cute as a button, Devyani was UN-believable, Meredith’s solo was lovely, and the Lilam improv trio put on the best set to date. I have personally never felt as comfortable onstage, and as connected to Jenn and Meredith as I did yesterday. We nailed the tricky transitions, didn’t flub any movements, and grinned like fools the entire time. The ladies from Devyani also gave us kudos on our set, and I think Meredith was fit to explode with glee.

Also interesting was a very nice lady who danced to the same drum solo I do, albeit in a very different style. What amused me was that in some places, she used the same movements I did. To me, this says something about the collective unconscious and universal movement choices – in other words, there are certain parts of songs that specify certain movements. This concept can be expanded upon by including level changes according to tone, or using the complementary instinctive movement (super slow over a fast beat, or vice versa) to build up tension, but that is an incredibly complicated post for another day.

Yesterday was also the first time I wore ballroom shoes during dancing, and I found that they helped tremendously. Since I can no longer go up in releve on my right foot, it helped me keep those lines while keeping the pressure off my bone spur, which kept me in the game longer than I could have done otherwise. I found them to be extremely comfortable, and the stiff toe box not allowing me to roll over my toe toward the instep helped me center my weight over the middle of my foot, and helped me keep my lift without straining my bad toe. An additional bonus was that they really, really boosted my spins, while the suede soles allowed me to grip or slide with the slightest pressure.

I am aware of the irony of being an advocate of barefoot running, and being forced to wear ballroom heels during dance, thank you. I think years of racking up the mileage in constricting running shoes gave me this problem, which originated before my return to dance. Plus, the movement involved in running versus dancing is the opposite – dance involves lift, while running involves impact down. Perhaps the combination of my night splint, exercises, and shoes will strengthen and correct my feet so that I no longer have to wear shoes unless I want to.

This is by far the most intense practice schedule I’ve ever set up (I’ve often joked that Lisa is trying to kill me.) The strange thing is, it doesn’t feel intense at all. Sure, 20 minutes of hip downs over port-de-bras makes my hips ache and my toes angry, but none of this feels like a burden. Which is strange.

Usually setting aside such a large chunk of time for anything would have my obsessive nature going into fits about a perceived lack of efficiency or waste of time, but the complete opposite is true. Lengthy dance practice, while being physically intense almost on par with Krav Maga practice, has become the most chill part of my day, and a non-issue both time – wise, and intensity – wise. Every day, at 7 AM, I practice for 2.5 hours, after my meditation and random morning stuff.

Finally, my dance practice has become both as fulfilling and as automatic as Krav Maga, and I’m seeing the same steady improvement. Plus, more chill is always good. The question is now, other than that thing in November, what am I going to do with it?

My containers all did very well over winter, so I’m going to have tons of flowers on the deck. I’ve installed two creeping perennial fixtures as well, which should reduce the amount of annuals I plant every year. Other than my zinnias, cosmos, and mexican sunflowers, I don’t want to start annual flower seeds anymore. I always start too early because I’m all trigger happy for Spring.

My herb/grape section in the plot is kicking major ass too. All the perennial herbs I moved REALLY like the new spot. I have a feeling that the old herb bed (and what is now the bush veggie bed) is nutrient depleted. I need to soak everything in seaweed extract anyway, so hopefully that will change. In the meantime, I may never have to buy herbs again.

I just bought a ton of supplemental stuff at good old DG, as well as Richters, which as far as I’m concerned is evil incarnate, due to the temptation of their crazy selection. Um, sure, I just wanted to buy a patchouli, but I’ll take these 15 other things too. I bought many creepers, rare perennial herbs, and live incense plants. Ooh, speaking of live incense, if I’m very very good, I plan on buying a live frankincense tree. I found one for a reasonable price at a rare herb shop.

OMG, veggies. I’m drowning in tomato sprouts, sugar peas, radishes, winter squish (squashes?) and teeny sunflowers and corns. I’m going to have raspberries in a few weeks too – a surprisingly good amount for having ripped up two plants from the container and tossed them in any old spot. I’d have more if Park Seed would be so kind as to ship the extra plants I bought in JANUARY. Loofahs, cucumbers, carrots, beets, strawberries, and leafy things are all doing moderately well.

What’s not doing so well? Limas, hardy kiwi, and freakin’ lettuce. What is it with me and sprouting lettuce from seed? It never works for me, and nobody sells head lettuce other than romaine. Also, like a dummy I keep plowing over my lonely honeydew which is literally hanging by a thread. Either it’s going to die any day now, or rise up and take over the bed.

Speaking of, my monster borage reseeded, and I have a mini-monster. It’s incredibly cute for something that’s going to grow to be nearly 4 feet tall and eat everything around it.

I’ve been dealing with an interesting issue lately on the topic of emoting in dance. When I started studying with a new teacher, one of my goals became conveying emotion as part of my growth as a dancer, as opposed to throwing together fancy steps to the same types of music.  What makes a good performer to me is the connection with the audience, and the interpretation of the music, none of which can be done without a strong grasp on emoting and expression. Additionally, seeing a performer who repeatedly dances to the same type of music with the same expression makes me lose interest. So, I set out to change that in myself as a performer.

Enter the problem. Generally, I’m not an outwardly emotional person, which isn’t very compatible with expression in performance. I like to keep my interactions somewhat superficial, which again doesn’t work with the concept outlined above. I crack wise and remain aloof, and don’t let the deeper emotions appear in public. So when I began tapping into the deeper emotions of passion, anger, fear, and exhilaration, I promptly freaked the hell out and started having panic attacks.

Now this was on top of extremely annoying classes and getting over Lyme disease, as well as my traditional post belt test freakout. So there were other factors in play. But the attacks were primarily around my teachers, classes, dance partners, and performance.  I found myself tearing up at performances and songs that I particularly liked, which is so far out of character it’s almost ridiculous.

This all happened exactly when I was forced to admit that I was actually… *gasp* …good at Krav Maga and Dance.

I perpetually frustrated the hell out of my mom for “not living up to my potential” when I was younger. I’d start an activity, and drop out as soon as I started moving beyond the beginner phase.  In fact, I dropped out of belly dance the first time around in 2005 (?) not only because of my nasty knee injury, but because I was getting ready to move up into intermediate.

Because you know, success is an anathema to the altruistic martyr who works hard for the sake of working hard.

I’m sure when all is said and done, I will be a better performer after this. I can’t exactly bottle back up what has been released, after all. And I’m sure I *can* be altruistic and humble while acknowledging my hard work has paid off in some way. In the meantime, I think I should learn to use the panic and fear to make me stronger, channeling it rather than running from it. After all, that’s what I’ve done in Krav Maga – when something scares me there, I sign up for six weeks of it and come out less afraid.

I think I owe myself at least that much in dance.

I’m about a week and a half through P90X, and I have to say that I like it a lot. I’m about 4 – 5 lbs down from where I was when I started, and what amuses me to no end is that it’s visible in a very strange way. Basically, I’ve kept my hips but lost my belly. Weird. My waist is down an inch from the last time I measured it, so I think that marks this experiment a success. Even though I didn’t do P90X for weight loss specifically, I’m not going to complain about dropping a little fat.

The most difficult part of the program is the leg series. I swear, my calves have been sore for a week. I don’t think the workouts are too intense while they’re in progress either – bag class is much more difficult. But a week of sore calves don’t lie.

I also really like the yoga series. I haven’t done any yoga in about a year since my Bikram experiment, and I forgot how much I missed it. The sun salutation / warrior series drags on a bit, but I’ve never liked sun salutations anyway. The floor series is great. It’s nice to be reminded of how much I like Hatha yoga.

I’m also back at the Krav Maga studio again after a short break due to my insistence on rest after a test, and a cold from hell. Any cold that makes me take a sick day when I WORK FROM HOME must be due to a demon from the netherworld. In the next couple weeks I’ll be starting up private lessons, which is simultaneously scary and exciting. Nothing like getting picked on for an hour by a giant red-haired person who can kick you through a wall if he so chooses. And yet, I voluntarily do this.

Dance is going surprisingly well. I say surprisingly, because what I’ve noticed is progressing is the feeling of ease on the stage, which is NOT what I expected to happen. In other words, it’s becoming easier not to be a ham because I’m nervous. We performed yesterday and I felt pretty good all around, even though there was one annoying woman at the front who wouldn’t shut up. As a soloist, I would be tempted to harass her, and probably would. Point being, it’s becoming easier to put myself out there. We’ll see how easy it is for my set in May, when I draw upon some difficult emotions.

I’ve developed a new teacher voice for Lisa in my head, that almost always says, “Well, that’s interesting,” upon seeing something that doesn’t work so well.

Additionally, it appears I’m chronically stressed. Also, Cortisol is a bitch. Who would have thought being sick for two years with Lyme, then Pneumonia, then Mono would be stressful on top of my admittedly borderline insane lifestyle? Can you feel the sarcasm from here? I’m trying out Phosphatydl Serine and Theanine supplementation to see if that makes me feel any better. I had a supplement with a low dosage of both that definitely DID, so we’ll see what the therapeutic dosages do. Maybe I’ll actually be easier to deal with.

I’m going on a self-imposed sabbatical for a bit, disconnecting from the non-anonymous online world (as opposed to this, which is not publicized to those who know me personally) and the most of the upcoming social events.  I need to get my game back.

February was tough. Ramping up for my Level V test was hard, battling Lyme disease at the same time was brutal. Learning to take my dance to an deeper place left me an emotionally raw. Running a show with a severe cold left me utterly exhausted. The massive snowstorm just pissed me off.

So, I’ve decided to take a break from the social scene and just study. Study dance intensively with Lisa’s recommendations. Start doing one-on-one focus mitt work with my teacher. Start P90X to cut up. Lift. Get back to basics, which, for me, is training intensively and eliminating distractions.

Secluding myself and training intensively has always been somewhat soothing – either the simplicity of it is appealing, or perhaps I just don’t like the distractions being around others inevitably brings. And honestly, the more I train, the less I want to deal with outside of my disciplines. I’m starting to understand why the husband was such a recluse when he was performing.

Channelling my inner Epicurus for a moment…in terms of energetic balance, the amount of energy one pushes outward must be met by an equal amount of energy projected inward. In simple terms, one should strive for equal amounts of activity and rest. So, the harder I work, the more rest I need. I’ve been working non-stop with no rest for several months, so it’s not surprising that I feel ready to keel over.

So, it’s time to rest and train, and come out even stronger at my next performance. I want each performance for the next year to be leagues ahead of the last in ability and visual impact.