Return of the Ball-Busting Ballroom Dancer…

Aye, I do not know what’s wrong with me. I am doing the same thing to Jacob that I did to poor Luis. And worse, it’s not with my head this time, but with my heel. Jacob was trying to teach me this lift from Tharp’s Sinatra Suites where he picks me up from the waist, I kick one leg up and go into splits in the air, and he swings me around in one rotation in that position. When he brings me down, I’m supposed to do a tango lunge, bending the front knee and sliding the back leg straight down on the floor between his legs. But for some reason, my body, which often works completely independently of my brain, keeps straightening the front leg and bending the back knee, so that my back heel is aimed right at his crotch on my way down. And, unlike Luis, who waited until the coach was around to quietly ask him how to fix this little problem, Jacob does not mince words. “Your heel is coming right at my man-part, Bunny!” he shouted excitedly. Who can blame him? Problem is, it made me all the more nervous, and I started doing it worse. I just can’t figure out what this is about. Did I suffer some weird childhood thing that I’ve repressed? Do I have something to say subconsciously that I can’t bring myself to express in words? Needless to say, we very quickly changed our lift-practice tonight to those where I lie on his back and kick into the air, AWAY from all of his body parts…

BTW, I have Stuttgart Ballet soloist Evan McKie to thank for the goofy term in this post’s title. He’s a newish, and very fun contributor to The Winger. Is it obvious yet how much I adore that website!?!

So, Emmitt has won “Dancing With the Stars.” Good for him, and good for us that footballers have tuned in to our sport in big numbers 🙂 Of course this means that my Latin goddess, Karina Smirnoff, did not take her student all the way to the top. But I got to watch her world-class dancing throughout the season, and got to know her personality a bit, which, happily, I found fun but in control, sweetly sassy, and, above all, damn hard-working, which is expected of anyone at the top of her game. Can’t wait to see you at Blackpool, lady!

Karina at Blackpool

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