Flying in New York

<<---- This is totally not me.

Today was my first day of trapeze lessons. I discovered the Trapeze School of New York about, oh, four days ago. being fearless, and also bored, I signed up for ten lessons at the bargain price of 50 bucks each. Obviously, since I had never done this before, or even thought about it, this sort of commitment was a big leap. But fuck me, I'm awesome. TSNY is located in a Sports complex on Pier 40; that's at the far west end of Houston. Nice view of LoDo. You can see the flyers on the roof from the West side highway, but really, you should be watching traffic. There's another indoor arena somewhere else. There were nine people in my class; three (very) burly dudes and the rest 20 something girls, all cute. (Great place to meet chicks, take note!) We were most pleased to be spending a Friday afternoon playing hooky and flying.

The trick was to swing out hanging from the bar, switch to hanging from your knees at the first peak, hanging your arms beneath you, switch back again, and then rock into a backflip dismount. We thought this was kind of a lot for a first adventure.

The first time, I didn't even make the knee hang. It felt like I was doing all the work with my abs, and they were not up to the task. And my calves cramped up major bad. So, we learn an important lesson: transitions are done at the peak of a swing, when you are sorta weightless. GO to early or too late, it's all muscle work. A couple of the people had been there before, and they did alright, if not graceful. The rest of us were a little sketchy at the leg hooking thing. The burly boys had trouble all day getting their foot through to hook their knees over. Too much muscle in the way? Lack of flexibility?

Having not made it, I realized that besides bringing my knees to my chin, I also needed to rotate my upper body back. This worked out just fine, and on the next jump I pulled off the hang, the reverse and the backflip dismount. And even though my calves locked up every time - why I have no idea (that happens during sex, too) I did the trick on the next two as well.

Therefore, I got to advance to doing a catch. Did I mention that the instructors were hot? As in damn? So, I do the knee hang, and super-hot instructor is on the next trapeze and catches me and we swing for a while. We pulled off the catch the first time and the second. I am very proud of myself, and not at all sore.

If this grad school thing doesn't work out, I'm joining the circus.

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