What do skinny ballerinas think about?

What do skinny ballerinas think about?

I have no idea.

Being neither skinny nor an actual ballerina, I have no idea what might be pirouetting through their tightly bunned heads. HOWEVER this is the second time that I have signed on for a session of the barre class at my gym.

Just to be clear, it is barre as in using the ballet barre on the wall, and doing lots of repetitions while staring into, what I hope is, an extremely warped mirror. There is also some Pilates and flopping around on mats involved.

It is not bar as in, “Hey, how does one mix a gin and tonic?! I’m guessing gin then tonic, but I paid for this class so you tell me.” This might be the more entertaining but less healthy option. My nutritionist and Skinny Blonde Doctor would definitely vote for barre versus bar. Bitches.

So while I have made the disclaimer that I am not an expert in this area, I will now go ahead and tell you what skinny ballerinas think about:

Toenails.

During this class, I spend a lot of time looking at my feet. Sometimes it’s about checking their position but mostly it’s about me bent over in ridiculous poses while I think about rolling back up “vertebrae by vertebrae.” There is also a significant amount time when I am reaching towards and beyond my toes. (My boobs get in the way of this. But because barre doesn’t involve a lot of jumping up and down, I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about my boobs except when I’m wearing that one sports bra. The one where righty tries to escape. Hey, Righty, nobody actually wants to be here! Suck it up!)

My toes look like trolls live inside my shoe closet. They are gnarled, twisted-in monkey toes. The second toe points towards the big toe on both feet. I have not redone the nail polish since Michele’s wedding on December 14. It is cracked and rubbed off in areas. The toenails themselves look crusty and misshapen. I have paranoid thoughts that the other skinny ballerinas who are also bent over to toe level, are judging my toes along with me. I think there is only a partial toenail on my pinky toe, but I’m pretty sure the cuticle will grow over it if I ignore it every day but the hour that I am in barre.

I can completely blank out on the whole “focus on your breathing,” “vertebrae” blahh blah blah in favor of fighting the socially unacceptable urge to reach out and crack off part of a toenail. I’m pretty sure that it’s cracked already and that if I

No, I don’t wear the homemade tutu for every class. It was Breast Cancer Awareness time and I need to make someone laugh.

really spent some special time with it, I could probably take half of it off. Most of my toenails could probably be vastly improved by falling off and just starting from scratch.

 

Leg Hair.

While my toes are a major preoccupation in barre ( in yoga as well), I’ve also discovered an entire unshaved strip of leg hair. Having my nose in close proximity to my shins brought a tiny forest of longer-than-everybody-else hairs into focus.

Yea, they’re pretty much going to stay that way.

I’m blind in the shower and every woman knows that the shin area is just a shaving accident waiting to happen. Plus no one has touched my legs in a “romantic” way since 2006 so I’m just going to keep obsessing about the toenails.

 

Farting.

It is rude to crop dust the person behind you at the gym. I don’t care what you are doing. In Body Pump, the new guy in front of me just let it all go during squats. SBD’s are not an acceptable practice. In the imaginary scenario that played out, I dropped my weights and tapped him on the shoulder saying:

“Hey, New Guy, there is no farting in gym class. I know you don’t have all the moves down yet,  but one of the major ones is holding in all your bodily gases. I had crab cakes and some very high fiber grains for lunch not to mention the steel-cut oatmeal for breakfast and all I am doing to feel the burn is holding in the noxious stench that wants to escape my butthole. Clinch it, dude.”

“Oh, and you’ll have to leave now.”

In barre there is a ton of bending, squatting, clinching and “zipping up your core.” “Zipping up your core” translates to keeping your fat gut and butt tucked in tight no matter what happens. The “zipping” exacerbates the internal gaseous turmoil because nothing is relaxed.

However when I’m holding onto a wooden bar, standing on one leg in releve, while bent over in straight back, I know that Michele is also right behind me with her perky little nose only inches away from my exit only bodily orifice. And it is so not cool to fart in your friend’s face.

Unless she asks nicely.