Time, timing, movement, the body. There are very few elements to ballet, just the body moving through time. Here is a short video from Studio 7 at Boston Ballet. Shot in the course of a day and with varying rhythms of time sped up and slowed down, it does beautifully encapsulate what a day of dancing at the highest levels can be, behind the scenes, day in and day out, over hours in one day in the video, but those days add up to years and years. To lapse in time back into those memories does remind me that I do miss it very much.
Dancing with people at such a level of technique and ability was something unto itself, unrepeatable. But in cycling there has been at least the smallest echo of that experience. The slight familiarity of dancing hard with others around and dancing over hours and days is there. The gatherings collide in my mind on occasion…the early in the day light, the speeds, the near constant motion punctuated by rest. Empty spaces getting filled like roads ahead that become travelled. Emily Gresh
Emily On A Bicycle 