The Times takes up Ballet?

What is it with Times columnists taking up ballet? Today's paper has Harry Hurt sticking his toe in the studio, and Judith Warner started dancing a few months ago.

Hurt's piece made me nuts - I wanted to get out the red pencil. Let's start with the crazy irresponsibility of beginning ballet classes by attending New York City Ballet's company class - even if just pretense for the sake of an article. That is a sure way to get hurt. The way to start is to gently ease into basic ballet classes meant for adult beginners, at a place like Steps or Peridance or the 92nd Street Y. Then, the pieces was full of inaccuracies, like these:

• Ballet slippers have elastics, not "ankle straps". They get sewn on across the instep.
• The morning class is not a "workout" class - it's just class, or company class.
• It's not a "ballet belt", it's a dance belt.

I don't read Warner's column very often, but that ballet piece struck a chord with me. Some number of years ago, I started ballet classes, and continued once or twice or three times a week for several years. It was wonderful - it was a time to think about nothing but where my feet were, what they were doing, how my arms and hands were behaving. The physical exercise was great, but the mind-clearing nature of the ballet class was the revelation - it's better than therapy for calming the brain and sweeping away the day's debris.