Sudden Stop

It's not the fall that hurts you at all*

I know I’m blowing the punch line with this photo.

Hello friends –

I’ve been trying to sort out just which axiom most adeptly sums up the developments of this week. Be careful what you wish for? Pride goeth before a fall? Look before you leap? 

A few weeks ago I asked my ballet teacher just how much more advanced some of the other classes on the schedule were. Just what, exactly, was the difference between “beginning-intermediate” and just plain “intermediate”? 

He broke down some of the other teachers for me – this one’s very “technique-y,” that one likes a fast petit allegro – but ultimately, he said, “You’ll be fine!  Come. Give it a try.”

I’d been trying to get it together since to do just that, but something always got in the way, including my own nerves. Until finally on Tuesday I packed up my gear and headed off to an early evening class taught by the same teacher I’ve been studying with since May. It was smaller than my regular Saturday class, and dominated by wildly flexible teenagers, but the few older women in the room all gave me a chin bob and a knowing look as I plunked my bag down under the barre and started to stretch. 

Overall, it went well. A little faster paced, a bit more challenging combinations, but I was, if not excelling, at least keeping up. We got to the last few minutes and it was time for the grand allegro – the big jumping combinations across the floor that are around the world the traditional marker of the end of class. They are also my favorite. It’s fun to run and jump and soar and the movement progressions make somatic sense. I rarely have to think about them too much. So I didn’t. I took off at a fast clip, piqué piqué tombé pas de bourrée glissade pas de chat. My arms flew above my head as I took an enthusiastic leap sideways in this “step of the cat,” one knee and then the other bending in the air, toes pointed, and then I landed hard and so very wrong on my right foot and crashed to the floor. The entire room heard the POP of the bone.

Five hours and another trip to the emergency room later I was home with a temporary cast, a fistful of Norco, and a referral to a podiatrist for my broken fifth metatarsal – a break known colloquially as the “dancer fracture,” the very sweet ER doc helpfully informed me. I’ll find out more tomorrow, but I’m looking at at least 4-6 weeks on crutches and another round of PT. As Paul said, “We’ve seen this movie before.”

I am, obviously, pretty unhappy about this development, which has thrown a wrench in all sorts of plans I had for the winter and which means, also obviously, that I can’t dance, or fly, or row for a while. Just as I was starting to revel in my body’s newfound strength, it’s been benched again. That;s the pride and the fall, I suppose. But acceptance is a funny thing. My mind has already wrapped itself around this latest new (ab)normal and I’ve stopped beating myself up for trying to fly too close to the sun. Bones heal. I’ve seen this movie before. And unlike last year, when I broke my ankle while already debilitated by chemo, I’m healthy just about everywhere but a four-inch span of my foot.

When I was admitted to the ER, I explained to the doctor what had happened and he said, “Oh, you’re a dancer?”

“No, no,” I said. “Not really.”

And then I stopped myself. I dance, therefore I am a dancer, right? I even have the name-brand fracture to prove it. And while the prospect of another winter of physical therapy does send me to some dark places, I trust that on the other side my body will still be there, ready and eager to move.

I’ll write more again soon.

*With apologies to Percy Sledge and Kelly Hogan, whose version of this song has been running on endless earworm repeat for two days now.