Pole Photos and Video – Page 4 – The Spin Diaries: Your Guide to Everything Pole and Aerial

New poleography vid and kinda/sorta the mid-year review blog hop!

Posted on August 6, 2014 by Cathy Vandewater

I think I wrote before about how I was struggling with what felt like a contemporary style in my poleography pole classes (Body and Pole choreography class, holla!), and I finally feel like I’m starting to get with the program!

I was struggling with taking myself/my movements seriously when they weren’t sexy, and oddly enough, I think ballet has built up my confidence with this. (Yes, I started taking ballet once a week because, while I sadly let my Groupon for a Real Dance Studio expire, my gym has a class taught by an excellent, real ballerina… that is totally included in my membership. She’s 100% legit–constantly correcting our form (nicely) and telling us how movements should feel–and I LOVE HER.)

So now that my head is chock full of “PULL UP” and “LINES” and “GET ON YOUR LEG” it’s easier to turn off the part of my brain that helpfully narrates my dancing with “OH SHIT OH SHIT I LOOK STUPID.”

Progress!

So anyway this isn’t anything particularly graceful, but I was feelin’ it and I think it shows.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the past year (probably because of that mid-year review blog hop going around), and how this was the year that I just kind of threw it on automatic. These days, I don’t think about it too hard–I just get my ass to the gym. I just stretch after every workout. I just go to the studio for pole twice a week and ballet once a week. I just. fucking. do it. And I stop immediately checking for results every time I do, because it’s a lifestyle, and I’m down with that. As they say in the ballet world, love the pain.

And you know what? I’m starting to see huge, permanent changes in my dancing. My lines are better. My flexibility shows. My hands and feet aren’t “dead,” even when I forget about them. These are huge wins for me!! It’s those things that make the difference between “looking terrible while learning choreo and then kind of making it passable” and “looking OK while learning it, then making it beautiful and emotive when it’s mastered.”

This is going to sound weird, but my body-mind connection is getting stronger too. Now, when I think about a movement I want to make, what I see in the mirror or video usually resembles what I WANT to see. I cannot stress enough how much this was not the case before. I would practice at home for hours thinking a routine looked great and then not even recognized the choreography once I saw myself doing it on tape.

These are small things that feel important to me because they’re real changes. I’ve learned tricks and then lost them a few weeks later, but these skills feel “for good.”

I hope.

Haha!

What changes have YOU made this year? What were your biggest accomplishments? Let’s pretend it’s still July and blog-hop this bitch!

XOXO

Tinder Screencaps Part II, and also a photo-dump!

Posted on July 11, 2014July 28, 2016 by Cathy Vandewater

Hey lady faces!

It’s family-gathering and wedding season, so I’m afraid I’ve been rather delinquent with my weekend poling. Luckily, my gym being a part of my workplace and all, I’ve been staying in pretty decent shape. Hopefully that translates into still being able to do pole tricks. We’ll see when I get back into the studio this weekend!

Speaking of the studio, here’s a little flow sequence I learned a couple of weeks ago that makes me cringe (not very smooth, but, I like to video things as soon as I learn them so I don’t forget!). I haven’t figured out how to style it yet, but I really dig the moves. You’ll just have to take my word for it that hey looked much better when Shaina did them 😛

Aside from slooooow pole progress, I’ve been spending time with my #1 CHICK, my niece Julia. She learned how to wave, kind of (she does it backwards), so, I lost like 9 hours of my life being entertained by that. Here’s a picture of her “waving” at my mom with just-out-of-the-bath hair. I mean….

Here’s us having an intellectual conversation up in the Adirondacks on the 4th of July. She was telling me her thoughts on Nietzsche, and also that she thinks popsicles are too cold.

On the dating front, I also spent some deeply emotionally satisfying time on Tinder:

Which made me just kind of tired.

In happier news, I had a bellydance show! Here are some pictures. It was a blast! That’s me, back center 🙂

So that’s what I’ve been up to. How about you guys?

PS. Does anyone have any awkward sunburns yet? I somehow ended up with a small crescent of burn ONLY on my right boob. So awkward.

XOXOXO

I hate teddies because I don’t like showing my stomach: keeping it real.

Posted on June 18, 2014July 28, 2016 by Cathy Vandewater

I have stomach issues.

That means two things, both related to each other:

1. I have issues showing my stomach because I never know what the eff it’s going to look like, and I can’t seem to find any correlation between diet and exercise and whether or not it’s going to be flat our puffed out post-natal style. (sorry).

and 2. I have literal, physical stomach issues. I have been in denial of this for a long time, because the aforementioned diet, exercise, and a very low dose of prescription meds mostly keeps it under control. During other stressful times (NOW, like, totally right now), things go a little haywire and all kinds of pain and general puffiness ensue.

I’ve been doing all the things I normally do to get things under control: up the dosage on my meds. Drink tons of water and exercise even though I’m feeling some ouches. Eat lots of basic, varied foods. But, ya know, I’m still dealing. It’s a flare up. And despite a better-than-ever diet and 5-days a week gym routine, it’s giving me a Homer Simpson gut.

…Just in a time for a belly dance show on Sunday! Yaaaaaaaaaaaaay.

Anyway, I’m still trying to live my normal life like this isn’t happening to me, and I was in a pole class when we decided to do a Teddy.

First of all, I fucking hate Teddies. Because:

1. I think they’re ugly. I mean… you’re basically holding your thighs open like, LOOK AT MY CROTCH. LOOK AT IT. I mean….

2. I can’t do them. I get up there and the underside of my arms is like NOPE, and then I slide down with a loud, long screech.

3. They fucking hurt to fail at (I can’t say “they hurt to do” because I have never successfully done one. Fuck.)

Oh yeah, and last but not least, I hate Teddies because never fail, when we’re trying to do them, the instructor says “you really need to expose a little stomach to grip the pole.”

And then I pretend that I didn’t hear so I don’t have to lift my shirt, but everybody else does. And then when I inevitably fail at my next Teddy attempt, the instructor will say again, “It will REALLY help you to lift your shirt a little and get some skin.” She’ll avoid eye contact with me so as to pretend that she’s not directing her comment at me, the only person in the room with my torso fully covered, and I’ll pretend once again not to hear her. The dance continues.

Yes, I really hate showing my stomach that much.

Yes, I’m aware that I belly dance and that’s pretty ironic. (I almost always keep my stomach covered in belly classes too).

Anyway, I’m already anticipating horrible, bloated pictures from my show, so here’s a preemptive strike: a picture of how good my abs looked this past Saturday.

I have so few days where my hard work actually shows, so while I was Face Timing a friend while chopping vegetables and went to wipe my hands on my shirt, I saw my stomach and went WHOA, GOOD STOMACH DAY FOR ONCE and snapped a shot.

I know it sounds vain, but when I’m in classes this week in a normally-loose top that’s stuck to my pot belly like cling wrap, I need that picture.

It’s an emotional thing.

Do you guys have a body part that continually embarrasses you? Am I missing something about the Teddy? How in the hell does your armpit support your whole body??? Pls explain.

If you don’t have AC, this is the opening of your official pole season!

Posted on June 9, 2014June 9, 2014 by Cathy Vandewater

Hot weekend, wasn’t it?

Nothing is a better incentive for me to get into the studio, personally, than the prospect of sitting in my hot apartment all Saturday.

Morning is fine, and evening will probably be spent gallivanting about in sundress, but that stretch from 12pm to 3pm is brutal, oppressive, and more often than not, totally squandered.

Which makes it PERFECT pole time.

I hit the studio for the first time in a very long time this weekend. Not that I haven’t been on the pole–I have! For several hours every week, actually, but teaching the same 5 or 6 moves to bachelorettes every class.

That means blistered hands and pole burn out, but very little headway on new skills or strength. I like to tell myself that all pole time is good pole time, but, that’s not exactly true… judging from my greatly diminished ability to invert and climb. Whoops.

Case in point: I took a Level 1 class at body and pole (with the fabulous Shaina) and it KICKED MY ASS. A Level 1. And like, kicked my ass to an embarrassing extent.

Here’s a couple of practice vids I shot after the hour and and a half sweat fest (disclaimer: summer is only a good time for pole if the AC is full functioning), which include a spin combo (dip into a pirouette with a bit of a fan-kick leg into a one-handed backhook) and a carousel-kick climb/fan-kick/thigh grip combo that DESTROYED me.

Sorry for all the hyphens, but wow, I was loving the complexity. Shaina does such a great job of giving everyone options to embellish according to skill level, and it makes for a lot of fun experimenting, and never-ending opportunities to push yourself.

How’s the summer poling coming for everyone else? Are we all seriously dipping into the dry hands? (I just bought 2 new bottles).

XOXO

Cathy

Okay, I’m getting a little tired

Posted on May 31, 2014May 31, 2014 by Cathy Vandewater

Hey gaaaaaaaais, what’s up?

I told y’all that I was teaching again, but Jesus, even I didn’t know I was going to be TEACHING. Like, anywhere between an hour and 5 every single night this week.

When I first started out, I came on the scene like THIS:

Now though, I have blisters on my palms, bruises on my knees, and large sections of the balls of my feet peeling off and I feel kinda like Lili Von Shtupp from Blazing Saddles:

And speaking of showers, between morning, lunch time gym sessions, and post-class detox, I’m up to 3 a day. Eep. Pole is truly a lifestyle.

Anyway, since I’m too tired to think critically about anything I’m doing right now, so here’s an awesome trailer for a documentary someone’s making about a ballerina who crosses over to pole. It looks really, really interesting (of course I’m biased).

This just reinforces my belief that a background in ballet or concurrent training is a perfect companion to pole. I mean… D’ose lines. I’ll never forget the first time I stepped into Shaina Cruea’s class at B&P and immediately just KNEW that she did ballet, just from the warm up. Her extension and toe point game is off the charts, and it makes her movement absolutely ethereal. (But in case you were wondering, she’s one of the kindest, most encouraging, lovely teachers I’ve had–not anywhere near as intimidating as her dancing 😉 )

How’s everybody? Are we all just playing hooky from the studio to go on picnics, etc? I am loving the extended Spring we’re getting in NYC, so much better than the Frigid=>Balls Hot jump we usually make from April to May.

Okay, BRB, teaching 4:30 to 10:30 today. Eeeeeeeep.

XOXOXO

Pole dancers on the subway!

Posted on April 8, 2014 by Cathy Vandewater

…sort of-kind of!

SHOW TIME, LADIES AND GENTLEMAN. I didn’t take this video, but I did see these exact kids a few days ago. Impressive stuff.

Coincidentally, I very recently was taking the subway home at 3:30am (LEAVE ME ALONE), and found myself alone in the car. Which I can never remember happening in almost 8 years of living in New York City. Only two things were holding me back from fulfilling my fantasy of taking the subway poles for spin: 1. a lack of Clorox wipes, and 2. a lack of someone to film me.

I mean, if I’m going to get a staph infection, there better at least be video evidence of what I did to earn it.

Gorgeous Photos of Home Pole Dancers on Slate.com Today!

Posted on April 3, 2014April 3, 2014 by Cathy Vandewater

Have you guys seen this yet?

I love the pictures, but I don’t really see the “humorous” juxtaposition of a domestic setting and a woman working out…. in fact, this reminds me a lot of being a pre-k kid and watching my mom follow her Joanie Greggains tapes from the sofa.

I also could do without the repeated use of the words “stripper pole.” But if it means seeing some lovely pole on my daily scroll thought Slate…. then, I feel like this.

Anyway, here’s the article… let me know what you think!

Can you spot the mess-up?

Posted on March 27, 2014March 28, 2014 by Cathy Vandewater

SO this is from like a week ago when I was working on a new floorwork routine (hence the legwarmers and the low camera angle). I’m working on finishing my freestyles instead of stopping every time I mess up (or when my leg warmers fall down), so I kept rolling. Smooth, right? 😉

Moral of the story: KEEP DANCING. Earlier in this video I snagged one of of my warmers on the floorboard, but I went with it, and when I went back to watch the vid, It totally looks like a purposeful, sexy pause. I would have hated myself if I stopped over something so small!

oh and here’s the floor work routine I was practicing (but didn’t bother posting before because it’s sooooo dark). Hard stuff, but when our instructor did it I got literal goosebumps. So imma keep pluggin!