Pirouettes of Doom!

Pirouettes are from the devil. For realz.
Like, Ol’ Scratch was sitting around one day and turned to his demon entourage and said, “Jeez, stop twiddling your pitchforks and do something! What am I paying you for anyway? Your good looks? No! Come up with something to bother the Adult Beginner, why don’t cha? That girl is way too chipper. And get me a sandwich! With extra mayo!”
I’ve heard that some people are natural turners, and as far as I’m concerned they can all take a long twirl off a short pier.
Well, ok, to be honest, I’m just cranky because I had decided that I was going to be a natural turner. And I was totally wrong!
Dang!
Anyway, so during barre we do pirouettes en dehors and en dedans.
En dehors mean outward, away from the midline of the body, and sounds like “on day oar”. Several teachers have given me the mnemonic “open the door” for en dehors, because you only open doors outward, apparently.
En dedans means inward, and it sounds like “on day don”. No teacher has ever given me a mnemonic for en dedans.
So I made one up!
Here it is folks!
En dedans is Eat Bon-Bons. Because you bring bon-bons inward, toward you body!
Right?
So later in class we’re in the center, doing pirouettes. I keep trying to sneak my arm back, to wind up for the turn, and Smirnoff keeps telling me to keep it at my side, no further back. Finally I ask where the turn comes from, if not from winding up my arms? And he says I must use my arms, but only from the side, no more. He says the way I’m winding up is like I’m preparing for fifty pirouettes. He says first I must do one correctly, then we’ll see about the other forty-nine.
Sometimes I think I should practice at home, but then I remember that the only non-carpeted rooms are the bathroom and the kitchen. And they are tiny. I’d probably end up in the oven.
I’m going to work it out someday. Can’t let the devil’s entourage win.

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