Dance Partner

It turns out that my "dance partner" thinks that we are still dancing together. Its been five months since we last danced together and he hasn't really contacted me in that time. He did last weekend (after some prompting from me!) and thats when I realised that I had moved on but he hadn't. Tricky! I wasn't about to dump him over the phone and he mentioned about catching up this weekend (today maybe?) so I might have the difficult task of breaking up a partnership that I thought was already over. Some people really need things to be written on a brick and thrown at their head to understand what is going on.
So why don't I want to dance with him anymore? In a nut shell. He wasn't as committed and totalyy relied on me getting him around the floor, including knowing all his steps as well as mine. He turned up late almost every time. He wouldn't ring me to tell me that he wasn't coming or going to be late until it was too late or I rang him. He would turn up and whinge about his life (the eternal victim) or be so out of it. He wouldn't do what he could to get better (I gave him music to practice to and an exercise book to write down his routines). And to top it off, he is now talking about moving up North to work. Oh but coming down every three weeks to dance with me solidly in the week he is here. I can't work with that. And I certainly didn't enjoy his moods! Or his attitude to other couples on the floor ( he frequenly wanted to run people down who got in his way!).
It won't be easy to tell him but it has to be done. He is a family friend so that wil make it a little harder. I don't want to upset him but this will.

Dance exam

I did my latin exam on Sunday (yes, bung arm and all!) and got my results yesterday. I'm quite happy with how I went (I'm blogging about it so you'd think I'd be happy!). I got 96% for the Rumba, Samba and Paso Doble and 97% for the Jive. She was apparently a hard marker! My mark for the jive was the highest mark on the day (there were multiple exams and students dancing on the day ranging from children to adults). The rest of my class averaged 89-90%. I'm over the moon! It shows that this 30yr old can still shake it!!!!!!

Bumps in the road

So as we travel along the path that is life, we do come across some bumps in the road. Some of us find small potholes, others find huge craters. I had a scare recently which could have been a crater.
I've been having shoulder pain since the beginning of the year which didn't heal completely. Three physios later and it was getting worse. My strength was almost non existent in that arm and of course there was the pain. The latest physio started talking about a tear in the tendon or muscle and asked me to see my gp about an ultrasound. I did and my gp ordered that and an x ray just to make sure. He hoped it wasn't a tear, that means surgery. How did I feel about surgery on my shoulder? Terrified!! If it had been any other part of my body I would have been ok but my shoulder plays a major role seeing as I'm a musician.
I had all the scans done straight away and the good news is that it is not a tear! PHEW!!! I have bursitis. Hopefully I won't need cortisone injections in the shoulder (the needle that the doctor gave me into my shoulder to relieve the pain was small and painful enough! I nearly passed out!) which are delivered by a larger needle and hopefully I can get passed this with anti-inflammatories and a little more physio. It was scarey though!
I know that people go through far more scarey events in their lives than this but for me, it was frightening. Not just the pain and the possible outcomes, but the loss of strength. I'm used to being quite strong in my arms and to see that disappear relatively quickly and to not be able to do silly things normally like lifting (even light things), reaching across your body etc.
It will still take time to recover and I want to be careful how I rehabilitate it but its made me sit back and take a little more notice of what we do to our bodies. I'm like many other people who keep pushing and pushing my poor body to and beyond its limits. You only get one body. Its a bit of a cliche but it is true. If you don't take care of it, no one else will. We have amazing people out there in the healthcare professions but, they are only human too.

My New Addiction

Not drugs or alcohol. Not betting or cigarettes. Its volcanoes! Yes volcanoes. I religiously check certain websites almost everyday to look at webcams of active volcanoes. I'm sure that my other half thinks that I am totally looney!!! There could be worse addictions!! Mt Etna is currently puting on a spectacular show which you can watch unfold in almost real time! Kileau (?) in Hawaii is another one to watch. The power and the beauty of Mother Earth!