{"id":610,"date":"2011-11-07T23:19:57","date_gmt":"2011-11-07T15:19:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.wordpress.com\/?p=610"},"modified":"2013-06-17T18:23:32","modified_gmt":"2013-06-17T18:23:32","slug":"usedtobemyplayground","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=610","title":{"rendered":"Used to be my playground – At Sea – [11\/07\/2011]"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s be\"\"<\/a>en a very long time. Nearly too long. You\u2019ve debated at times taking the skill off your CV altogether, what right do you have to claim it when you\u2019ve not picked up the tools in nearly 10 years? How can you say you remember anything? But then, you figure, you promised your friend onboard, and you keep your promises. So you pull out your oversized suitcase from under your bunk bed, and dig through to the bottom until your fingers touch old worn leather. There\u2019s one, you have to dig again for the other one, they must have gotten separated during transport. You feel vaguely guilty that you never bothered to unpack them before this.<\/p>\n

When you first sit with them in your lap, watching her buckle up her perfectly polished perfectly shaped high-heeled Bloche character taps you feel foolish. This wasn\u2019t a good idea. What were you thinking? It was a long time ago, it\u2019s over. You\u2019re still a dancer sure, but you\u2019re a swing dancer now, be happy with that. Let it go\u2026<\/p>\n

You feel like a poor country cousin watching her fasten up those beautifully cared for perfect shoes.<\/p>\n

Ooooh! You brought your characters?<\/em><\/p>\n

Yeah\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

I debated, but mine just weigh too much\u2026got into a debate with my mom about it \u2018for once leave one pair of dance shoes at home\u2019\u2026besides, these are old friends\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>And they are. When you slide your bare foot into them you\u2019re reminded that this is why you have a slightly trick knee – you never did remember to replace the insoles. Long since lost, forgotten, danced through. Instead the calluses on your heel scrape against the rough surface of bare wood. No cushioning between you and the floor. You don\u2019t care to remember how many times your technique teacher yelled at you for that\u2026crazy girl! You can\u2019t dance on straight wood! <\/em>She said\u2026<\/p>\n

The leather is brittle, and stiff with lack of use. For a terrifying moment you think that maybe they don\u2019t fit anymore. But no, they just need to be warmed up, re-broken. You stand and flex your feet, bending them at the arch with the toe on the ground, like a horse pawing the track. The leather fits snug, and smooth, like a second skin. \u00a0They\u2019ve fit like that since the first day you took them out of the box, almost too small, but perfect once they stretch to your foot.<\/p>\n

You hear the reassuring click from the metal on the hard floor, ringing out, reminding you that here \u2013 it\u2019s hard to hide your mistakes. Hesitantly you lift one foot\u2026<\/p>\n

Shuffle\u2026<\/p>\n

Shuffle\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Stomp\u2026hop shuffle step, slap, step stomp, stomp stomp<\/strong> hop shuffle step slap-step-stomp<\/em><\/p>\n

And you look at the far wall, muttering aloud that you wonder if you\u2019ve completely lost your ability to spot even as you pin the spot you need to look at, leveling your eyes with it. Single footed turns you can\u2019t do, never could, not with the alignment of your own bone structure working against you, but double-footed turns? Different story. No one could beat you at speed cramp roll turns, and while you wouldn\u2019t want to go up against a professional, it\u2019s nice to realize you can still hold your own without getting dizzy\u2026<\/p>\n

Step, toe ,toe, heel, heel stamp<\/strong> toe, toe, heel, heel<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>They were the best present your grandmother ever gave you (\u201cI don\u2019t care what anyone says, that\u2019s the only brand worth dancing on, and it\u2019s the brand you\u2019ll dance on\u201d was her attitude. Never mind that Bloche was probably a better brand, with sturdier toes and clearer taps, if it wasn\u2019t capezio, it wasn\u2019t worth dancing on).<\/p>\n

So you became a capezio girl\u2026and you still are, to this day.<\/p>\n

<\/em>Capezio, size four\u2026split sole, tele-tone taps. Metal starting to wear thin at the tips. Danced through at heel and toe, laces snapped in more than one place\u2026to the point where the right one is hard to do up properly, always has been.<\/p>\n

Welcome home kid\u2026<\/p>\n

Bloggers note:\u00a0 I was 20 when I finally walked away from studio dancing. When I walked away from the world of class-structure and logo-emblazoned t-shirts (though half my wardrobe still bears the logo of one studio or another)..there were a lot of reasons why I moved to a different sphere of dancing\u2026why I took my training to a different level\u2026or at least a different place\u2026for the most part I never looked back\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Except of course\u2026when life throws a weird opportunity in front of me, and I can\u2019t help but turn my gaze backards\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

One shiney shiney\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>And all that\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s been a very long time. Nearly too long. You\u2019ve debated at times taking the skill off your CV altogether, what right do you have to claim it when you\u2019ve not picked up the tools in nearly 10 years? How … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,6,39],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-below-the-waterline","category-flash-backs","category-grand-asiaaustralia-2011"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3GtNE-9Q","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=610"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/610\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2191,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/610\/revisions\/2191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}