Ombailamos

thoughts, provoked

I really love dance in all its forms.  I'll read or watch pretty much anything I can find about dance, and often I find it relates to other material I'm developing.

We recently watched a three-part miniseries on Ovation called "Dance School: Juilliard," which was basically a non-fiction version of "Center Stage."  It was a very talky program and not really made for anyone but true dance fans, but I'm glad to have seen it.  Among the many thought-provoking comments made by the dancers, teachers, and choreographers interviewed for the show were the following:

"Dance happens Everywhere."  - William Forsythe, choreographer.  No comment needed on this.

[I used to be attracted to sports, but dance has] "a much broader range of ... the definition of success." - a Juilliard senior.

I wrote down that second comment because it rang one of my bells.  I'm not proficient in any style of dance other than ballroom, but even in my field, there are so many ways to be a good dancer.

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Among the fifteen students interviewed for the program (there were sixteen in the senior class, but one declined to be interviewed), there was a common tendency to be extremely romantic in their view of dance - as something that they were "meant to do," that gives their life meaning, that they can't live without - while at the same time they are extremely pragmatic about the difficulty of the dance life. 

Every one of the seniors appeared well aware that their window of opportunity to join a dance company or otherwise become well-known and fully-employed in the industry would basically close within a year of their graduation - because by then, another class of top-notch dancers would be on the market.  Not only that, the anticipated lifespan of their full employment as dancers was fully expected to expire in about ten years.

I would love to see a really in-depth look at professional dancing as a part of professional athletics.  There's not so much difference between theatrical dancers and basketball players, after all; most who make it as professionals do so by working on their athletic skills to the exclusion of almost everything else.  The scholar-athlete is an extremely rare creature, and the scholar-athlete with a balanced personal life is nearly mythical.

And yet, the differences are many.  The dancer, once his or her performance career is over, is not very likely to have been paid one million dollars even over ten years, while the professional ball player may be paid millions every season.  The dancer may have only ten possible places of employment in the entire world, while the ball player has dozens of potential teams just in the U.S.

On the flip side, a dancer is not likely to suffer a catastrophic injury, or to get into an armed dispute outside a nightclub and end up in prison.  The dancer also has the very real and achievable post-performance career path of teaching open to him or her.  An ex-ballplayer typically can't start up his own baseball or basketball school (although maybe some of them should).  Many dancers are also temperamentally well-suited to professions such as yoga or Pilates teaching, physical therapy or massage, which is not the post-professional path expected for the typical ex-ballplayer.

The world is a little less hard on ballroom dancers, at least now that the old Lawrence Welk Show stereotypes have faded.  It's not impossible to take up ballroom dancing in mid-life and become a professional!  That can't happen for ballet or jazz or tap or even hip-hop dancers; if you're not there by the time you're out of college (if you even go to college), your body simply won't have what it takes.  And while the composition of theatrical dance companies is definitely changing, most companies and most choreography are still built on the bodies of the young.

For those of us who have taken other paths, I guess the idea to take away is to be both romantic and pragmatic about our choices.  There's nothing wrong with following your dream, and loving every minute of it - as long as you're prepared for the day when, inevitably, it ends.

getting fit, for its own sake

I can't even count the number of badly-written or misleading fitness/health articles I've printed off the Web and stuffed into my "blog this" folder.  One I've been carrying around because it's such a prime example of irresponsible editing was published February 4, 2010 by LiveScience on msnbc.com and was titled, "Is exercise worth your time? Genes tell."

On one level, I'm grateful that fitness/health articles get written at all.  But knowing that the majority of news consumers are not critical readers or thinkers - that is, people are predisposed to believe what they read, not to assume they need to consider the context, authorship, or veracity of what they're reading (that is, not skeptical like me) - I just wish that writers and editors would not go out of their way to put a bias on news pieces.

In this case, what primarily offends is the title.  "Is exercise worth your time? Genes tell."  Someone glancing at that title might think, great!  Another excuse to not work out.  Or they might think, great!  Another reason my workouts aren't doing any good.  But this article is about only one measure of fitness, and perhaps more to the point, a measure that is of concern mostly to elite athletes: the VO2 max, or aerobic capacity.  As the article says in paragraph 2, "This is a measure of how much blood your heart pumps and how much oxygen your muscles consume when they constrict to, say, move your legs on a treadmill."

VO2 max, then, very simply is a measurement of total blood volume moved, and total oxygen transferred, by the heart through the blood vessels to the muscles during exercise.  It is not a measure of any other potential effect of exercise.  It doesn't account for calorie burn, weight loss, strength gain, muscular remodeling, blood lipids or blood sugar management, agility, flexibility, balance, bone mass retention or gain, organ function (aside from cardiovascular), or any of the other things exercise is known to improve.  And it's not even something that the average person can measure.

Most people don't train to reach a maximum blood volume/oxygen transfer.  Most people train to look and feel well, to improve their sports performance, to lose weight, or just because they enjoy it.  The article, which references a study in the Journal of Applied Physiology, does say that "exercise has benefits, regardless of whether or not a person can improve aerobic capacity."  But the study is looking at genetic factors that may minimize the effectiveness of training to improve VO2 max, specifically.  And these factors do exist. 

Does this mean that exercise isn't worth your time?  OF COURSE IT DOESN'T.  So why would they even put that question in the article's title?  I'll tell you why: to draw eyeballs.  The editors don't care if you read the whole thing.  They don't care if you understand the difference between VO2 max and general fitness.  They just want a click through on the headline for their page-view count.

VO2 max is just like maximum extensibility, which I've written about before.  It is a maximum level of a physical capacity, that is determined in part by physiological genetics - the instruction booklet for your body's assembly - and in part by your activity level and health in childhood.  If you have polio, your maximum extensibility will be affected; if you have pneumonia or pertussis, your VO2 max will be affected.  If you're completely inactive as a child, both will be affected.

This is NOT, however, to say that these capacities - or any other physical capacities - are impervious to renovation.  Plenty of studies show that people well into their 80s can improve stamina, flexibility, agility, balance, and strength - and mental function.  While your maximum limits of achievement in fitness may be to some extent predetermined, your potential for improvement is not.

Most of us never even approach our maximum achievement, for any physical (or mental) capacity.  Most of us coast through life using a mere fraction of our potential.

So please, don't use the latest sensational headline as anything more than a moment's diversion.  Don't let some obscure study on some arcane measurement influence your motivation to get fit and stay fit.  We feel better, we work better, we love better, we think better, when we're fit.  

We have the power to get up and walk/bike/swim/dance/lift weights/do yoga/climb rocks/insert activity here.  Yes, some people are compressed by their life circumstances into little tiny boxes in which they literally cannot move.  But if we're honest, that's very few of us.  (See: Paralympics.)  If we are not fit, it is nearly always because we have chosen not to do the activities that would make us so.  That means we are choosing not to have the full experience of life that we could have.

Fitness is a lifelong practice, and our approaches to it can - and should - change more or less constantly as we go through life.  The one thing we cannot do, if we want to have anything approaching a full and healthy life, is nothing.

the economics of social dancing

I love people who dance.  Let me say that right off the bat.  The vast majority are fun-loving, friendly, good-hearted people.  But I've been involved in the dance world for going on thirteen years now, and there is a tendency among social dancers that I want to call out.  And that is, a sense of entitlement.

Folks, we love putting on dances for you.  But it costs: either in money, or in time.  There is not a single social dance venue in Los Angeles that couldn't be making more money doing something else.  That means putting on social dances involves some sacrifice, and that needs to be respected.

Show me the Money

Take Ballroom by the Bay, for example.  I have taught numerous group classes there, as have instructors from By Your Side, in Culver City, and other studios.  None of us has received payment.

The hosts at BBTB do it for free.  The DJ does it for free.  The people who help with setup, cleanup, and security do it for free.  The dance admission is only $10, and for that you get a light snack, a free lesson, hours of dancing to well-chosen music in a very nice, not-inexpensive-to-rent facility.  No venue could do this as a for-profit endeavor.  Most for-profit venues that offer any dancing at all provide only a small dance floor and make money on food and drink sales on top of an admission fee.

The same goes for USA Dance.  The chapter spends a LOT of money to rent that big venue.  Consequently, their admission fee is a little higher.  But all of the work going into those dances - and there are over a dozen people working through each dance, not even counting the planning time - is done for free.

Dance studios generally provide a monthly (sometimes more frequent) social or "practice" dance.  Usually these are open to the public.  In no case does the studio owner make enough money from admissions to pay for his time, an instructor's time - often there is a lesson preceding general dancing - refreshments, setup/cleanup, and security.  The studio could be offering private lessons, group classes, or event rentals during that time.  They provide social dances as a way of fostering a dance community for the students and the public.  It is marketing, but it's a loss leader.

Group classes in general are set up for social dancers.  Once people are interested in competition or showcase dancing, they go into private lessons.  That is where studios make their money.  Some studios specialize in competition coaching to the exclusion of everything else; they may have practice hours, but the people on the floor aren't dancing for fun; they're dancing their competition routines.  Other studios are closed systems (like the big chains), which have their own competition circuits, closed studio parties, and other events.  These studios don't even try to draw "outsiders" for social events.

The studios who do are most often independent.  A studio owner is typically only one of several instructors working in the space.  He or she has to do all the work of running the business in addition to leading group classes and teaching private lessons.  Most of the other instructors are not employees, but independent contractors.  Every time one of these professionals gives an hour or two or three to host a social event, he or she is working, for you, for free - and what is more, he or she is giving up either income or personal time.  That preliminary lesson may serve as marketing for the instructor, but it's still a time cost.

Social Economics

The social dancers who attend these events - whether in a studio or in a public venue like Ballroom by the Bay - come from a range of backgrounds.  You may not be interested in the lesson on a particular night.  You may not choose to dance in the mixer.  But I'm asking you to please respect the hosts and the other dancers. 

If you don't care to participate in lessons, come later in the evening.  If you want to get there early, but not take the lesson, please keep your conversational volume down while the lesson is in progress.  Even if the instructor is amplified, there will be people in the class who miss instructions if there's other noise in the room.

If the hosts provide a show - of ANY kind, even if it's a first-time performance from a couple that's only been dancing a few months - please don't talk through it.  It's extremely nerve-wracking, for all but the most seasoned professionals, to do a performance.  All we really want to hear is the music and some applause. 

If professionals can hear your conversations while performing - or while teaching - it's going to affect their willingness to come back and support the hosts.  The hosts cannot continue to improve these events in the absence of professional support.  It's what's called "social capital," and we can't afford to squander it.

So please, respect your hosts.  Respect the professionals who contribute to social dance events.  Respect the fact that everyone involved is giving up their time, and sometimes their money, to provide a fun social dance experience for you.

Ask not what your dance hosts can do for you ...

It is always okay to ask social dance hosts for services that aren't currently provided.  If they can find a way, they'll generally try to get their dancers everything they can.  But take criticism off the table.  Don't complain about the dance, especially to people who have never attended. 

If you've had a bad night, of course you can - and probably should - mention it to one of the hosts; if it's because of something they can fix, don't you think they'll try?  Of course they will.

It is a fact that in any organization run by volunteers, a very few people end up doing a very large proportion of the work.  If you regularly attend non-profit social dances, help out where you can.  If you like the lesson that's been provided, sign up for a private with the instructor.  Bring chips or cookies or TP one night.  Take an hour to watch the door.  Or just contribute an extra $20 once in a while.

But the biggest and best helps you can give to social dance organizers are simply to show up, to dance with joy, to recommend the event to your friends, to bring guests, and to speak well of the organizers and your fellow dancers. 

Think of everything that goes into putting on a dance, and appreciate the fact that other people are doing it.  See you on the dance floor!

foiled again ... but undeterred

Well, drat.

Mr. P was SO unwell that competing wasn't really an option.  So once again, High Desert is over, and we didn't get to dance.  This means that I am extremely motivated to prepare for our next outing, the Orange Blossom Ball (www.orangeblossomball.com) .

Insert commercial:

If you enjoy Dancing with the Stars, if you enjoy social ballroom dancing, and/or if you would rather support DanceSport than, say, wrestling - I encourage you to drive to Riverside on April 3.  The Orange Blossom Ball is a very well-run event with little downtime and a wide range of competitions.  Last year they had syllabus and open events for all age groups, a spectacular professional show in the evening, and even a little time for general dancing. 

Spectator tickets are only $15 for the whole day.  A preliminary schedule has now been posted.  AND if you want to participate, you can still enter!  For those traveling to Riverside the night before, there is even a social dance on Friday 4/2.

I really highly recommend the Orange Blossom Ball for any of the following:

• USA Dance members interested in showcase or competition dancing
• USA Dance board members interested in organizing showcases or competitions
• NDCA competitors interested in polishing routines for the Emerald Ball
• USA Dance competitors interested in polishing routines for the Nationals
• Ballroom enthusiasts who want to support our sport
• Parents or friends of competitors - we respond well to applause and cheering!
• Fans of DWTS who want to see what real DanceSport looks like

Anyway, there you go.  We'll be there.

Back to the High Desert

Tonight the High Desert Dance Classic kicks off, with salsa and West Coast Swing events and workshops.  Tomorrow there's ballroom/latin and more swing.  Tomorrow and Sunday there's also the Dancing Feet finals for the Antelope Valley public schools' participating 6th and 7th graders.  This is a terrific program and I'm proud to be associated with it.

Per family tradition, Mr. P and I have both gotten sick this week.  I am blaming it partly on the accumulation of pathogens we've both been exposed to from sick co-workers, clients, and friends, plus our personal failure to get out in the sun more over the winter.  This is something we really know we should be doing, and yet we don't.  The most sun I get on the average day is what comes blazing through my windshield as I drive to work.

However, I'm making a vow, right here and now, to break this tradition next year!  Next winter, I'm gonna get out in the fresh air and sunshine.  It's not like we don't have plenty of it.  This is the fourth year in a row I've gotten sick in March, and I'm sick of it!  Phooey!  Done!

And in this defiant spirit, I fully intend to drag poor wheezy Mr. P out on the competition floor tomorrow and do our waltz-tango-foxtrot.  We need it for practice, if nothing else, and an interesting physical effect I've noticed of moderate exercise such as dancing is that it clears up my congestion for as long as I keep moving.

If there is anyone out there still waffling about what to do, dance-wise, this weekend, I do urge you to pick up your car tires and wheel them out to Antelope Valley College.  There are workshops all day, competitions to watch, and plenty of general dancing.  It's fun, it's cheap, and the weather is supposed to be perfect.  After all the rain we've had, the drive out is awfully pretty, too.  Come join us!  For more information, visit www.highdesertdanceclassic.com.

bit by bit ... bite by bite

"You’re not going to get in shape in an hour. It’s going to take eight, 12, 16 weeks to get in shape," says Walter Thompson, a professor in the department of kinesiology and health at Georgia State University. "If you haven’t been doing this for 10, 20, 40, 50 years, you’re not going to cure that in an hour session."

This is at the heart of Americans' struggle with fitness and health, I think.  We look at where we are now and imagine where we want to be in a month or six months or a year, and we forget that the sum total of our life experience is reflected in our present physical state.  In order to turn back the clock, we have to heal our injuries, cut out the indulgences of our adulthood, and restore the activities of our youth.  And of course, if our entire life has been inactive, we have to learn entirely new ways of being in order to make our later years healthier.

It's rarely the case that a single big nutrition or activity change will "cure" all our physical ills.  Going vegetarian, for example, or taking up running may have health benefits but probably won't, in and of themselves, take care of all of a person's physical issues.

A flurry of news articles over the past few days have pointed to some interesting new obesity research.  Having bacterial overgrowth in the digestive tract can, apparently, contribute to weight gain by interfering with the body's appetite signaling process, as well as the ability of the digestive tract to actually transfer nutrients into the bloodstream.  Eating too much processed, packed-in-plastic, or pesticide-laden food can, apparently, contribute to weight gain by interfering with the body's natural hormones.  Certain medications can, apparently, contribute to weight gain by disrupting appetite, mood, nutrient absorption, kidney function, and much else.

I really don't want to harp on this issue.  I'm just bothered by all that these news stories leave out. 

The main thing that they leave out is the big picture of the studies they cite.  The three factors listed above, for example, may be very well substantiated, but they leave unanswered a serious question: do these things contribute to weight gain in the absence of increased calorie consumption?  If so ... how? 

Because I just don't believe you can gain weight (fat or muscle or bone, real tissue weight) if your calorie intake is not greater than your calorie burn.  Cells don't multiply without energy.  You may retain water - which can look like excess tissue - but that's almost always transitory, unless it's caused by a chronic condition and/or a semi-permanent regime of certain medications.

No matter how much bacterial crud you have in your colon, no matter how big a proportion of your food is packaged crap, no matter what meds you're on, if you don't eat more calories than it takes to sustain your living tissue, you won't gain weight.  You may not be healthy, and you almost certainly won't feel very good, but you won't gain weight.  Nearly every top nutritionist quoted in the world news agrees on this, but somehow these people are never asked to quote for the articles finding obesity factors besides overeating.

Anyway, I guess if I have a point it's this.  If you are seeking a solution to your weight gain, by all means consult a doctor to: 

• Find out if you have intestinal bacterial overgrowth.  If you do, find out what natural - meaning sustainable - ways of treating it are open to you.  They might try to sell you a lot of antibiotics, but I'll bet it's as simple as eating more fiber, more fermented foods, more unsugared yogurt.
• Find out if you have high blood levels of BPA (Bisphenol-A), which leaches from plastic food packaging and disrupts the endocrine system.  If you do, get the plastic out of your house - or at least out of your microwave and away from your beverages.
• Find out if the medications you take are known to disrupt appetite or mood, or to otherwise contribute to weight gain, and find out if there's something else you can do to address your conditions.

I wrote recently that no-one is destined to be fat, and since this has been so much in the news I've returned to the subject.  I believe the best nutrition to be that which is closest to nature, or to what the average person could produce given the time and skill.  That means foods that come wrapped in plastic, or foods containing ingredients created in labs, are not on my preferred list.

Start small.  Use up the chips/crackers/cookies in the house, and don't buy any more.  If you want snack foods, learn how to make them at home from real ingredients.  Stop buying beverages packaged in plastic.  Don't heat up dinner in a plastic container - I don't care if it says "microwave safe."  All that means is the container won't melt.  This is why we have Pyrex.

It's not going to happen in a day, and that's okay.  Let it take as long as it takes.  It's okay to make one little change, get used to it, and then make one more little change.  I've said this before, too.

Take your time.  Love your body.  It's the only one you've got.

reading roundup, January-February

The below is a list of books I read in the first two months of the year.

1.  On a Hoof and a Prayer: Exploring Argentina at a Gallop, by Polly Evans.  2. Home is Where the Wine Is, by Laurie Perry (of Crazy Aunt Purl).  3. Falling for You, by Jill Mansell.  4. What I Did for Love, by Susan Elizabeth Phillips.  5. A Breed Apart, by Pierre Davis. This was really good.  6.  Yes Man, by Danny Wallace.  7. Quick, Before the Music Stops: How Ballroom Dancing Saved My Life, by Janet Carlson.  8. A Year of Dancing Dangerously: One Woman's Journey from Beginner to Winner, by Lydia Raurell.  9. From Ballroom to DanceSport: Aesthetics, Athletics, and Body Culture, by Caroline Joan S. Picart.  10. Debt is Slavery, by Michael Mihalik.

11. Birds and Words, by Charles Harper.  12.  The Vintage Caper, by Peter Mayle.  Very entertaining.  13. The Prosperous Peasant, by Tim Clark and Mark Cunningham (of Soul Shelter).  14.  A Year in Provence, by Peter Mayle.  Almost as good as a real vacation.  15.  And Only to Deceive, by Tasha Alexander.  16.  Silent in the Grave, by Deanna Raybourn.  17. A Poisoned Season, by Tasha Alexander.  18. Hot Rocks, by Nora Roberts aka J.D. Robb.  19.  A Fatal Waltz, by Tasha Alexander.  20.  Kitty's House of Horrors, by Carrie Vaughn.

21.  The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen, by Jacques Pepin.  22. Manhunting, by Jennifer Crusie.  23.  Star Struck Dead, by Sheila York.  24.  A Good Knife's Work, by Sheila York.  25.  Frames, by Loren D. Estleman.  26.  Alone, by Loren D. Estleman.

I am getting a little more into memoir of late, but as you can see the preponderance of my reading is fiction.  I was re-reading the Tasha Alexander books in advance of sending them to Goodwill; as I've written previously, my housekeeping rules require that books may not consume more of my living space than I've currently allotted, so in order to accommodate new "keepers," some old ones have to go.  Of the above 26, I am keeping 12. 

The first 14 titles were all new; 5 of the last 12 were new.  I went on a bit of a binge around the turn of the year, and presently have a sizable stack of books queued up to read.  Must stay off Amazon till those have all been dealt with!

The big discovery of these two months (since I already had one each from Sheila York and Loren D. Estleman - the second title from each was a continuation of an existing character line) was Pierre Davis' "A Breed Apart."  It's a really stellar scientific thriller ... think Michael Crichton, but with good characters and dialogue.  Was also happy to discover Peter Mayle, though that was bittersweet since I picked them up at closing sales at a Border's store.  Always sad when bookstores go under.

This month my pace will be a lot slower.  Too much dancing to do!

in the news: shoot your television

Your TV is killing you, according to a March 5 story on msnbc.com.

The story refers first to a report in Circulation: the Journal of the American Heart Association which found (simplifying here) that every hour spent in front of the TV translated into an 11 percent increase in the risk of death from any cause.  This finding was based on a six-year Australian study and was consistent even in participants who "didn't smoke, were thin, ate healthy diets, and had low blood pressure and cholesterol."

Well, wow.  That means if I, on any given night, spend an hour sitting on the couch watching "Holmes on Homes" and two hours watching a movie, I'm 30 percent more likely to die than if I ... did what?  Moving on ...

Okay, next scary bit: a report in Alcohol and Alcoholism found that viewing "films and commercials in which alcohol was prominently featured" resulted in male university students drinking 1.5 times more than those who watched material "in which alcohol played a less prominent role."  We do what we see, I guess.  I would be more surprised by this result if the population studied were, say, employed single women.

Then the next scary bit: teens who watch a lot of TV including sexual content were twice as likely to get pregnant/impregnate a partner.  This doesn't surprise me a bit, since it's highly likely kids watching that kind of stuff are home alone, i.e., not getting parental supervision or conversation about things like birth control.  And heaven knows TV doesn't provide any good information about THAT. ... If you see behavior that is presented as desirable and attractive and appears to have no negative consequences, and if you are too ignorant to contextualize that behavior, then, yeah.  Ignorance is a natural condition of youth; it's why we send them to school.  And, ideally, talk to them.

A fourth scary bit: a study in the Journal of Pediatrics  reports that the more TV kids watch, the less bone they grow - making them more susceptible to disease, fractures, and osteoporosis later in life.  Again, no surprise here, as every hour kids watch TV they are not out running around in the yard or playing sports or dancing or doing anything else active to promote healthy development.  They are probably also getting fat, which in itself is a risk factor for disease, fractures, and osteoporosis later in life.

And the final scary bit: if you have the TV on, you're paying less attention to your family (surprise!), according to a study in Child Development.  This seems so obvious I can't believe a reputable journal published a study on it, but there you go.

Now for my rebuttal.

I'm mostly looking at the first point, the lead, which produced the title and is in fact the only study quoted as actually finding a correlation between TV viewing and increased death risk.  I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with those findings.  But I have a feeling the msnbc story left out a lot.

The study as reported by msnbc doesn't say what pre-existing conditions any of the study participants may have had, what their average age was, what their professions were, how active they were, what their marital status may have been, or where they lived.  All of these factors affect total death risk. 

You can be a thin non-smoker with healthy blood pressure and cholesterol and still have diabetes, for example; by year 6 you might have died from insulin shock. 

You can be in perfect health in year 1 but work the graveyard shift with a 100-mile round-trip commute; by year 6 you might have died from sudden cardiac arrest, suicide, or a car accident (all associated with the suggested factors).

For that matter, you can be in perfect health in year 1 but be 70 years old.  By year 6 you might have died from one of the myriad diseases which catch up with us, some swiftly, in old age.

All I'm saying is, the TV might not be the deciding factor here.  The biggest question left unanswered was, among people who watched less than two hours of TV a day, what were they doing with the rest of the time?  If they watched an average of two hours of TV, but ran or biked or danced or surfed for an average of an hour every day, how would that skew the result?

The original study may have answered all these questions.  I'm just pointing them out by way of illustrating that news stories are often incomplete, and the sensational headlines may be misleading.

Because really, I don't believe that watching TV for three hours a day is inherently worse for me than sitting and knitting by the radio, or reading, or painting, or anything else sedentary, for three hours a day

It's all about balance, folks. 

And by the way, please talk to your kids about birth control.  A story that ISN'T getting much attention is that of sexually active adults who don't want to get pregnant, 20% either don't use contraception at all or use it inconsistently/incorrectly (see Feministe).  These are people who say they DON'T want to get pregnant!  People, I have news for you: if you really don't want to get pregnant, you HAVE to use contraception, probably two kinds at once.  This is not something to leave to chance.  IMO, if you don't use contraception, you DO want to get pregnant, and you're not too fussy about when or with whom.  Go ahead, flame me.

live and learn

I recently started having some pain and stiffness in my right calf muscles.  After a couple of weeks of self-massage, extra stretching, and annoyance had no effect, I consulted Mr. P.  He tells me that what I've been experiencing relates to tight tendons, specifically the tendons attaching the big muscles of the calf to the femur, which cross the joint vertically behind the knee. 

The points of pain were at the ends of the tendon; I had sore spots deep in the calf muscle and at the bottom of the thigh in back (or, as a personal trainer might say, at the distal end of the posterior thigh).  The latter of which were only really discovered when Mr. P got in there and started with the therapeutic massage, which let me tell you is not relaxing.

So I asked him, what do I do about this?  And he told me the only way to really release the tendons is to hyperextend the knee.

Well, great!  Something I've been consciously avoiding for years, now becomes necessary.

To hyperextend a joint means flexing it *away* from its natural direction of flex, or bend.  In the case of the knee, obviously, the joint naturally bends forward; so to hyperextend means I need to push (cautiously, gently) the joint backward.

Most of the time, people are advised NOT to hyperextend the joints, because doing so can weaken the ligaments (bone to bone connective tissue).  Consequently, for all my years of yoga and dancing I have consciously supported my knees (unstable joints at the best of times) using the big locomotor muscles and the little hidden stabilizers.  Now I have to tell them to disregard some of the instructions they've been given over the years.

Naturally, as soon as you get an insight like this, you start making connections.  For example, I have excellent joint range of motion.  But I have noticed on forward and back leg raises, that unless I flex my foot (push the heel out and pull the toes toward me) my leg extends with a slightly bent knee.

So, one of the exercises I have added is forward and back leg raises with a flexed foot.  Another is a hip flexor stretch with a (cautiously, gently) hyperextended back knee.  When I do a standing forward bend in yoga, I lift my toes off the floor (I can touch the floor when I do this, so I add stability with my hands).  I'm doing seated leg raises in my desk at work, with a flexed foot.  And I'm practicing walking around the office and house taking my stride to a fully-straightened leg, keeping the knee locked at the point the foot is maximally flexed and the femur can't go back any further in the hip socket.  This also results in a strong contraction of the gluteus muscles, something we desk workers can appreciate as we fight secretarial spread.  It's not unlike the action of race-walking, with the contraction of the gluteus complex used to pull back the thigh.

One of the side benefits to this work will probably be a greater overall knee stability.  I recently read a study concerning women athletes' greater propensity to blow out their knees than men.  The study did a mechanics evaluation and discovered that women have a tendency to decelerate using the quadriceps, whereas men more typically use the gluteals and hamstrings.  Essentially, women brake from in front, while men brake from the back.  More actively engaging the gluteals and hamstrings will almost certainly mean removing stress from the ligaments of the knee.

It seems very likely that my recent discovery relates to years of dancing in high heels.  Despite what Len Goodman told Brooke Burke on DWTS, it's not really desirable to have hyperextended knees in dancing, because once the joint is locked you can't generate any power through the limb.  Your leg should look straight, but not be locked straight, if that makes sense.

We shall see how long it takes me to retrain my limbs.  In the meantime, I am applying continued self-massage and acupressure as well as my new exercises, and am grateful I have an expert on hand when an issue like this comes up.  Thanks, honey!

DanceSport basics, part 4

This will be the last in this particular series, and I hope it's been useful for someone.

My previous posts have discussed how a dancer might prepare for a competition debut.  The information I've given here is only the beginning, of course: each individual dancer will find they have unique talents and challenges.  A dancer may find that Standard or Smooth dancing comes more naturally than Latin or Rhythm; they may find that the partner they prefer to work with likes a different style than their first choice; they may find that they need to work with more than one teacher, or to change teachers, in order to achieve their goals.  Partner dancing is a constant negotiation.

And competition dancing is a constant process of learning, un-learning, and re-learning.  How you dance at the Bronze level will be very different from Silver, much less Gold, and once you progress into Open dancing you will find that the additional freedom presents even more new challenges.

One thing I haven't focused on is what not to do.  I can't speak for other chapters, but our local chapter of USA Dance has never provided much information for competitors and indeed the national organization has somewhat walled-off competition information from the world of social dance.  (This is a shame, because most social dancers would have an improved experience if they had a better technical foundation.)  I think it would be useful to look at the restrictions that NDCA places on bronze dancers in American style in its rulebook.

First, why just American style?  Well, because in International style, there is an extremely consistent method of teaching.  Pretty much all Bronze students learn exactly the same figures in exactly the same way, and the various instructors' methods for putting figures together into a competition routine at the Bronze level is not strongly differentiated.  (For example, you will often see a group of Bronze Standard dancers doing exactly the same sequence in a competition; and you will see a group of Bronze Latin dancers using exactly the same arm stylings.)  Moreover, because International style has been consistently taught and codified for a very long time, there is a large body of teachers and past competitors who know how it "should" be done.

American style, by contrast, is a more free-and-easy style.  It is the basis for "social" ballroom and as such is subject to a great deal of improvisation and to a great range of teaching methods.  This provides an advantage:  it's easy for a good social dancer to move into competition without a great deal of extra coaching.  This is balanced by a disadvantage: it's easy for a social dancer to end up competing with material that will get them disqualified.

Note: USA Dance used to let you start competing any old place you wanted.  You could enter a Championship event first time out, if you so chose.  But they are pulling in the reins as they try to make DanceSport a more intelligible and consistent experience, and now someone entering as a first-timer in competition will need to enter Bronze.  (You can still progress as fast as you want, but must move sequentially through the divisions.)  This may be frustrating for long-time social dancers who are accustomed to doing continuity Smooth, for example, or for improvising or doing fancy picture lines.  That said, it is never a bad thing to go back to basics.  You may find you missed something important the first time around.

When Mr. P and I began our competitive journey, we had a terrible time - terrible! - trying to find out what we were allowed to do ... and, just as important, what we were not allowed to do.  I asked USA Dance competition organizers, judges, officials, teachers ... and ultimately was directed to the ISTSD (International Society of Teachers of Dancing) syllabus, which included a Don't Do This section.  Now this information is included in the NDCA rulebook, but I have a feeling many amateur competitors are not getting the data at a time that would be most useful to them.  We sure didn't.  So, here are the highlights.

In the American Smooth dances, a Bronze dancer:

must not completely separate from his/her partner.  "Open work is limited to single or double hand holds, and may not last for more than eight (8) consecutive measures."

must not do foot changes or fakes resulting in the partners commencing a measure on the same foot.

must not do solo or shadow figures; fallaways; or multiple turns.

must not do consecutive pivots; only one pivot is allowed.

must not do picture lines: contra checks, oversways, lunges, dips, drops, etc.

In the American Rhythm dances, a Bronze dancer:

must not use shaded timing or syncopations, except in the Triple Cha-Cha.

must not completely separate for more than one measure of music except in the Chase Turns in Cha-Cha.

must not do foot changes or fakes, except in the parallel breaks/sweetheart/cuddle in Cha-Cha.

must keep both feet close to the floor at all times - this applies to Smooth, as well - which means no aerial ronde or developpe actions.

Additionally, of course, dancers must break on the *2* beat in Cha-Cha and Mambo.  It is possible to be the only couple in your event and still place second if you break on the 1.  The "break" is the forward rock step, so it *is* possible for a leader to start moving on 1 in Cha-Cha - but only with a side step.

Other Must-Do's

A competition couple should practice entering and exiting the floor in a way calculated to present themselves to the judges and audience with dignity and grace.  The couple should walk on and off the floor arm in arm, with the outside arm extended upward as if to say "here we are!"

A competition couple should practice turning out and bowing at the end of each dance in the heat.  A composed exit to the dance helps you transition to the next dance in the heat.  No matter what just happened, this is your opportunity to push the re-set button and get in character for the next dance.

A competition couple should practice keeping their eyes up: always look for the room's horizon, not the floor.  Keeping your eyes up helps keep your chin up, which helps your entire posture and top line.

A competition couple should practice conscious breathing while dancing.  Breathing makes you relax and move more easily.

A competition couple should practice making eye contact and smiling at each other whenever possible during each dance in a heat.  A couple that appears distant from each other does not present the sense of intimacy and connection that judges look for.

You can find more chat about dance technique in the "Strictly Ballroom" archives.  Feel free to suggest topics for future posts, in the comments!