One of the nice things about going back to ballet in my forties has been that I actually enjoy it in a way I wasn't able to as a competitive young dancer. I look at myself in the mirror and I think, "Wow, I can DO that," where I used to think, "I hate my knees!" or something along those lines.

Another nice thing is that leotards, tights, and dance shoes have all gotten so much more comfortable. No more scratchy nylon or glistening spandex! Split-sole technique shoes! And best of all, the new pointe shoes are just so much better than the old ones.

What? Forty-something bunhead on pointe? Sure. Why not? Okay, don't tell me why not. But let's just take a look. My last pair of pointe shoes from back in the day were Capezios, one of the first models they made in imitation of the Freeds that were actually de rigeur at my ballet school, but the ballet mistress had taken pity on me and allowed me to buy the Capezios when I started going through a pair of Freeds a week and my dad threw a fit. But for the added durability I paid an, ahem, stiff price. Those babies were hard as rocks. I still have them, complete with bloodstains and horrible black marks from beating them against the wall to try to soften them up. They're really, really ugly, not to mention I can still recall how much they hurt my poor young feet.

Now I'm on my second pair of Bloch (European Balance, size 5xx, for my "peasant" feet) pointe shoes; delovely! Of course, pointe is not for the faint of foot, but these are actually quite comfortable and I've only had one blister in all this time, that caused by my toe pad being a bit out of kilter. Oh, yeah, toe pads. Old style: bare feet, tape, sweat and blood. New style: lovely little padded toe sock, no blisters, no blood.

One of these days I'll post a compare and contrast photo of my pointe shoes old and new.

Okay, time to go do some plies.