August 2010

-
-
2010-08-10 18:36:00
decision...
Well, I think my decision is made. I bought tap shoes today. I'm not giving up skating, but I think I'm going to take a semester off (maybe skate Saturdays...) It's so weird, because I hate jumping, yet I trace my downfall in skating to when I had to stop jumping (aka hip injury). Even though I've been able to get back on the ice, I just don't enjoy it anymore. I want to do a program, and I can't do that without jumps. So this fall I'm going to take a tap class and ballet/modern class. These are adult classes, so I have low expectations for them- and with my hips and knees that's probably a good idea. If I can do the ballet with my hip, I'm going to consider going into kids classes, so then i'll really have to reevaluate skating. I've never tapped before - so that will be an all new adventure. No matter what, the goal is to get into shape. I'm well overweight now, not "just barely" like a while ago. I'm very disappointed in this, in having to get large leotards (I'm 5'0"- large is for nothing else but being large, not tall). I'm upset, and I need change. I am guessing most of my readers (I have a few...) won't be interested anymore, but I plan to keep writing. And maybe someday, skating.
public

-
2010-08-31 09:57:00
Tap Class
Last night I took my first tap class. It went pretty well, and the best part is my hip did not hurt! The class was pretty large, maybe 14 women. I think the youngest was senior in college, and most of the ladies looked like they were probably mom's of dancers at the school. There were varying degrees of ability ranging from never danced a day in their life to some who seemed pretty good at tap, and could do quite complicated steps the instructor threw in for them. It was a combination based class, and taught entirely as follow the leader. We started with a really basic warm up- just tap,tap, tap and then swishing our foot in "smiles" to warm up the ankles. One of the other women jokingly offered to lead the warm up, as her 5 year old had taught it to her earlier that day- LOL. Then we moved to our combination for the evening. Sadly the music was one of my least favorite songs ever "Lean on Me"- though it was the Glee cast version (we did the warm up to Don't Stop Believing, which I love, though I think I might like Journey better, but it's a tough call) The combination was taught in 3 parts- the first part was just an easy fallap 4 times, then this heel toe thing, then a heel-toe, step chug to the side, then repeat on the other side. The second was shuffle-ball change, shuffle, toe (behind you), step, then heel clicks, jump to center. At this point, after having done the first combination quite a few times we added in a heel so it was fallap-heel if you wanted. I added that without a problem. Then she taught an advanced intro, which I skipped. I didn't know what the steps were, and she did not teach them, as they weren't for the beginners. Then the 3rd part was paradiddles first slow, then very fast, 2 heel stomps, and a step. The 2 heel stomps were the hardest part of the class, until she mentioned you should start the movement before you finish the paradiddle, which made sense to me. After going through that a few times, she added into the 1st combination again- this time a shuffle, pull back-toe. The pull back is apparently a backwards fallap, but it was done with the weight countered from where it needed to be. She also didn't teach it, but just gave it to the women who already knew it- 2 did. For those of us who wanted to add more steps, we just did shuffle, jump to toe (in back). I added that in, so I guess as this class goes I'm "intermediate"- I added in 2 of the 4 optional things. At the very end of class she changed the music to an entirely different tempo, to show that the steps aren't to go with the music (and really- I never got the connection between the "counts" and the song) and we did the full combo VERY fast. I actually liked it much better with this fast music- the steps seemed to actually go with it. The bad things: 1- in dance mirrors I look fat. Really fat. I've never thought I look THAT bad, though I do know I'm overweight and it's gotten unacceptable, but in this studio, I look actually fat. 2- What the heck do you do with your arms in tap? I didn't like not having any arm movements. It was ackward. 3- I watch the mirrors a lot. I don't know where the confidence in my dancing goes. I found that I could do the combos without watching other people if I watched the floor, but I couldn't watch myself. Then I got messed up. Weird. *I have no idea if I spelled things right. I don't know anything about tap.
public