Afternoon at the ballet

I apparently over-did worse than I thought last night. I was worthless today. I finally got up around 8, mainly because Stomach was yelling for breakfast. I made some mac and cheese and just lay back down on the sofa when I got done. I only woke up to switch sides once, and finally the phone woke me up beeping. I groped out of the fog at 11:30 (I thought) to see that Robert had called. So I called him back and was enjoying talking to him, as usual, when as I became completely lucid, I realized it had been 12:30, not 11:30 when I answered the phone. It was now a bit after one, and I was supposed to be at the box office at 1:30 to exchange the "sponsor tickets" for actual seats. Needless to say I had to get my ass moving.

To make matters worse, Nancy showed up at the box office at 1:30 - and I wasn't there. But I did manage to get there in time for the performance, although I had to pay ten fucking dollars to park close (where the hell am I Atlanta?!), and wear a golf shirt because I didn't have time to iron anything. But I got the tickets exchanged, and waded through a sea of little girls in various stages of ballerina drag to collect Nancy and get to our seats. We were seeing The Nutcracker.

I still wasn't feeling stellar. I had a headache through the whole first act. Nancy was kind enough to fish some Aleve out of her purse for me to take at intermission.

This was the Carolina Ballet, and it was pretty good. The production values were good, and most of the costumes were good, with the notable exception of the rat costumes, which were basically gray flannel bags with tights and ears. The dancing varied greatly. They corps was a little sloppy, and of course with so many young ones you can't expect the assurance of a seasoned dancer; but the principal dancers were on the whole of very good quality. They had a couple of really good younger girls, but most of them were about at "dancing school recital" level. They had a lot of really little children that they did some exceptionally cute things with, including four little girls in adorable bird costumes that ran through some scenes flapping their tiny wings.

There were an unusual number of really good male dancers, which surprised me. The guy who did the Spanish Dance was very good, and during the Arabian number, they had a young black dancer who was just beautiful. Anything he lacked in technical prowess was more than compensated for by his excellent bearing and beauty. There was an African American family sitting next to me with a young boy. For some of the program he was a bit restless, but I noticed when this young man took the stage, he went completely quiet, mesmerized. I thought about how that would feel, to live in a white world and then see someone like you in a production like this - to not only see someone like you, but see him take possession of the stage, proud and beautiful, defiantly shirtless, so strong and graceful, head thrown back and chest thrown out. I was proud for them. I imagine it felt something to him like I feel when I see Rudy Galindo skate, which just always makes me cry. I was also pleased to see that, though they partnered this young man with a Caucasian girl for their dance, it seemed to be appropriately a non-issue for the people attending. Unfortunately, that's the kind of thing you can't always take for granted around here.

I had free tickets to go today because my beautiful neighbor Frankie was dancing. She had told me that she was one of the "guests" in the wedding scene, but hadn't told me she was one of the four bridesmaids and had a pas de deux! I was a bit worried before I saw her dance, because I am a terrible liar. If she wasn't good, I was going to have to find something I could say that wouldn't sound too insincere. She had a character role as the grandmother in the first scene that was fairly low-key. But oh, she was exquisite at the wedding. Lovely and so wonderful. Personally, I thought she was a much better dancer than the girl she was paired with. She has gorgeous extension, and an inherent grace that really can't be taught - it has to come from inside. I was so proud to know such an amazing creature that my eyes filled with tears. For the rest of the production, when she was on stage I watched only her.

Nancy seemed to really enjoy it too. How cool for her to see Nutcracker for the first time live! I was just tickled I could do that for her. We saw Lance on the way out, and talked to him about the ballet, but I decided to gush over Frankie at home. She probably had a hundred little girls waiting at the stage door to see her anyway.

By the time we got out, my headache was gone, which was good. Since I had been worthless all morning, I had stuff I needed to do at the house. I went by the grocery store on the way home. When I got back, I did some laundry, and a bit of cooking, and planned lunches for next week. I started putting things away - I had so much stuff drug out all over the house (Christmas shoes, my suit airing, etc). I whooped up some gravy to go with the rest of the Thanksgiving food (almost gone, but there is some left). I finally found small-mouth jar lids - at the BiLo a block from my house - after they told me they didn't have any when I needed them. Grrrrr. So I got some and just put them away with my jelly jars. By bedtime, I had things pretty much back in order.