The Disjointed Life

Hi friends! I know--it has been a LONG time since I posted, and there are some very good reasons for that. First, of course, is the global pandemic. Which is, by the way, STILL HAPPENING. As someone with EDS, I'm on the list of folks with an autoimmune condition, and given the fact that I'm...

The things that don’t come back

I know it's been a long time since I posted here, mostly because thanks to my day job and this thing called a global pandemic, I haven't been training as much or teaching as much as I used to. But I am training, and I am teaching (online conditioning), so I haven't left it all...

What you don’t see

What you don't see in this picture is that fact that I was awake for an extra hour the night before with throbbing pain in my pinkie finger that felt like it was broken (I broke it a few years ago). What you don't see is the fact that I woke up at about 3am,...

Unexpected Surprises

One thing I will say about the pandemic--for all that I'd really rather it not have ever happened--is that I find myself being forced into different patterns of exercise that (interestingly) are teaching me some new things about how my body does and doesn't work. I've been doing most of my exercise at home or...

(In)Visibility

I'm reading White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo right now, and she ended one chapter with the now nearly-proverbial example of a child in a grocery store pointing out to its mother that someone nearby has Black skin. DiAngelo talks about how our impulse as white people is to shush the child, and that this action...

What We can Live With

I know it's been a hot minute--or twelve--since I last posted, and there are a variety of reasons for that. Holy sh*!-balls, teaching during a pandemic is HORRIBLE. I easily had twice as much work as during a normal semester and I was teaching an overload so... yeah.At one point, one of my students exposed...

Take it Slow

I know this blog has been somewhat neglected of late, but guess what, kids? We're in a global pandemic. And yes, I know that many nations are trying to "open up" again, but here in the US that really isn't working out all that well for us. My home circus has started taking students again--in...

It Goes Both Ways

Circus during a pandemic is a very odd thing. In addition to the fact that you're doing circus in a way that is quasi-solitary (yeah, there's someone else in the room, but she's way over there) and lacks spotting; the fact that you're wearing a mask which is hot and occasionally awkward when it slides...

Back on the Bar

This post is being typed--slowly, and with a lot of typos--in the immediate aftermath of my first training session back on a trapeze after five months (!) of no circus. My hands are killing me. For those of you about to embark on a similar adventure, here are my immediate impressions (which I'm sure will...

Brushing the Dust Off

By the time you see this, dear readers, I will in fact have gotten back in the air after a very long time grounded due to COVID-19. Thus far, I have been fortunately to have not contracted the virus, although with schools (and circuses!) opening back up, that risk increases. My next post will be about...

Dear Normal People

This post is an open letter to the "normal" people I know who have folks in their lives with chronic conditions. If you know me, you're one of them. I want to address something that's become incredibly difficult and real for a lot of folks with chronic conditions in quarantine right now: this sucks, and...

Toughen Up… Buttercup.

I want to talk about something that we don't often talk about in circus or, quite frankly, outside of circus because of a bizarre cultural obsession with "toughness." It's something I've been guilty of perpetuating, and I do think that sometimes advocating for toughness is actually justified. I think that "toughness," however, is probably not a...

Me Here at Last on the Ground

So. Global pandemic. That's a thing that's happening, and it is grounding a lot of circuses and circus artists. If you happen to be one of those lucky people with a home gym or studio or freestanding rig... I hate you a little (not really, but I am ragingly jealous). I don't. I live in...

Breaking Up

Sometimes, after weeks or months or years of working on a skill, that it actually clicks. Despite torn hamstring connectors and knee issues and a fractured foot, I actually recently had a break of the good kind, and I have to remember that it's important to celebrate those, especially for folks whose bodies don't often have...

Circus in the Time of Corona

The literary nerds out there will recognize the title reference to Love in the Time of Cholera (Gabriel Garcia Marquez), and my fellow-Shakespeareans and medievalists have probably been having weird recognition moments such as "So this is what it's like when the Privy Council closed the theatres..." Or maybe that's just me. Either way, a global...