Tuesday, 7 January, 2020
It feels very strange to type 2020. I hadn’t thought of that before. Am I supposed to make resolutions for the whole decade? I really should. So far my only resolution for the year is to eat at one restaurant on my list every week. In fact, that wouldn’t take too many weeks so definitely doable.
I’d like to be less lazy, waste less time, do more – more of all sorts of things. So far so bad, though. There’s still time, right? Ten years less seven days, anyway.
On the third, I had tickets to go see a children’s version of The Nutcracker at Sadler’s Wells’ Lillian Baylis theatre. I love these shorter version of classic ballets. They’re perfect for my short attention span. First I took the bus to Islington Green at Angel to have a bit of lunch.
Juliet was going to bring her grandson but there was a last minute switch and instead we were taking her granddaughter, Dessi. Dessi was very excited and told me that she’d seen the ballet before, the CBeebies version. With Juliet on the aisle seat, me in the next, and Dessi closest to the centre, we sat and waited.
Even the short ballet version felt long at times. Dessi kept me entertained. After only a couple of minutes she announced I want to be a ballerina just like they are. I thought how lovely it was to be so inspired. When one of the dancers appeared onstage, she announced loudly – the lone voice above the iconic music – It’s the Sugar Plum Fairy, and after a few rapt minutes I love the Sugar Plum Fairy. She then loudly whispered to us, When I go back to your house, grandma, I’m going to dance all the way there. There were six ballerinas sharing roles on stage. Four were slender, two were sturdy. I noticed, just like last year, how lightly they landed with each leap and step. At the end of the show, all children are invited to come down to the stage to take photos with the dancers.
Dessi and I raced down to get there, only to find out that we had come down the wrong way. Up we went again and all the way to the back of the queue.
Everybody was moving slowly, parents were hogging the spotlight for their children – none of this surprising – and then suddenly with only half the children having moved down to the stage, we seemed to moving extra quickly.
Dessi had told me that she wanted to dance with them on stage so when she stood there, I reminded her and she held her arms above her head, all the dancers following her lead.
