Flying high above the sky

It's decided.  I'm quitting my job and joining the circus. 

Or maybe not. I don't know if living in tight quarters with elephants and clowns is really the best idea in the world.  Especially when I require lots of sleep and very specific hair care products. 

Why this sudden interest in the three-ringed world?  I took my first ever flying trapeze class the other day and surprisingly loved it. 

It probably shouldn't have been that surprising that I loved it.  It was my idea after all.  Nobody was holding a gun to my head and forcing me to do it (unlike the poor woman in my class who's husband made her do it and who was afraid of heights.  She barely made it through one flight before she sat the rest of the class out).  

I was actually really excited about doing it. 

Until the night before.  When I remembered that I hate falling and that flying through the air 30 feet off the ground would probably replicate that feeling pretty well. 

But, we had already signed up and paid our $70 (+$22 registration fee) for our 2-hour class at Trapeze School New York.  

So off we went on a (gorgeous) Sunday afternoon to the South Street Seaport. 

I honestly don't know what I was so worried about.  I volunteered to go second in our group, just to get that first fly over with.  We were hooked into a harness, with safety lines and incredibly knowledgeable (and awesome) instructors.  We pretty much just had to do whatever they said -  no real thinking involved on our part. 


At first we learned the leg hang - where you're flying upside down from the bar by your knees with your arms hanging down below you.  You start off holding on to the bar, then bring your knees through your arms and over the bar, before letting your hands go.  Just reverse the motion to come back upright and let go to float down to the net. 

The leg hang - just not with my arms down yet.
Look at me go!

I know, it sounds difficult.  I honestly didn't think that I'd be able to pull my legs up to the bar - that takes a lot of core strength on the ground!  

Except that it kind of doesn't in the air.  Gravity does a lot of the work for you. And the instructors do a lot of the work for you too - from the ground, they yell out the exact moment to move your body to get the biggest advantage from gravity and make your flight as easy as possible. (See, there's photographic proof above that I can do it!)

(The instructors did yell a lot while you were flying.  But that's because everything was extremely reliant on timing.  So they weren't mean yelling, just making sure that you heard them and did what they said.  One woman in our class did not like this part.  So it probably wouldn't be recommended for people that don't like being yelled at!)  

After we learned that basic flight, we built off of it.  First was the back flip dismount - which was admittedly slightly terrifying the first time I tried it.  I mean, I was flipping backwards and upside down in the air as the net was getting closer and closer!  But I mastered it (ha!) by the second try. 

Finally, we did a catch. Which was probably a lot of work for the instructor that was doing the catching, and really not so much work for us.  We just had to get in our knee hang and put our arms out and wait for the catcher to grab us.  You're supposed to let your knees go at that point, but honestly, I didn't have to consciously think of letting them go.  My legs just kind of followed along with the rest of my body. 

The catch.
In my mind, I looked a lot more graceful than I do in this picture. 
Apparently not.

After the catch, we had time to learn one more trick.  I'm not entirely sure what it was called, but it basically involved you getting into a position where you're pretty much face down, looking at the net as you let go and do a swan dive, arms and legs straight out (think Superman flying through the air). In a real trapeze act, this is part of a catch and someone's supposed to grab your outstretched arms as you let go.  In class, the instructor working the ropes on the harness just lowered you slowly down to the net. 

This was the one trick that actually really freaked me out.  I got into the correct position right as the instructor called for it, but when she called for me to hep (which is trapeze lingo for let go.  It's also the cue to jump off of the platform and start your fly.), I freaked out.  

I mean, I was face down staring at the net and logic told me the only way to go was straight down.  I finally let go on the second hep call, but instead of floating gracefully out in a superman pose, I kind of flailed around and landed on the net on my feet (which you're not really supposed to do.  You're supposed to kind of sit mid air and land on your butt). 

Not the best way to end my trapezing career.  

But I had a ton of fun.  And apparently snuck in a lot more exercise than I thought.  I woke up the next morning with incredibly sore arms and shoulders (like, muscles I didn't even know existed), bruises on my calves, and rope burn on my arm (which was totally my fault).

If it wasn't so expensive, I'd definitely want to fly more often. (Seriously, why do the fun workouts all have to be so freaking expensive?) The circus might not be in my future (I feel like allergies would be a real issue too), but maybe I could follow our instructor's lead and go work at Club Med?  (That's also apparently where the founder of TSNY got the idea for the school.)

I'm also happy to lend my expert knowledge to anyone who wants to take a trapeze lesson and is too afraid to go it alone.  Seriously, call me. I'll go whenever.