Temper, Temper

I spotted the hole first. I'm that observant. I'm always on the lookout for trouble. Of course, I can't speak for the other dancer gals. On a Tuesday night that felt like Monday, it was a miracle any of us showed up. But that hole, by George, it got my attention. I saw it and I knew, instinctively, someone had punched the sh*t out of the wall. That hole screamed temper tantrum. That hole meant hand injury and blood, emergency room visit and stitches. That hole symbolized a whole highly dramatic scenario. Had some crazed ballerina done a wonky triple pirouette and smashed the crap out of that wall in frustration? It seemed unlikely.

But who else would've taken their anger out on a wall in a dance studio? Then I remembered the studio has hosted many interesting activities over the years. Puppy-training. Beauty contestants. But Wall Punchers Anonymous? It seemed unlikely. My dancer friends didn't know bupkis about the hole. So I did a little investigating. I turned to the one, the only Doug Rivera, our teacher extraordinaire, and hooked him into my latest obsession."Dougie, go find out who put that hole in the wall." Good thing he does whatever I tell him to do. Out the door he went, and seconds later, came back with an explanation. The exposed plaster, the fist-sized hole was the work of a mad Russian acting student. An over-emoter. Someone getting really, really into a scene.

".... so go ahead and smash the wall if it feels good."

Doug began to speculate what kind of acting class had led to the infamous hole: Stanislavski? Strasberg? Adler? Meisner? Was it an example of Affective Memory and Substitution? Past emotions to generate current emotions? Was it a Brando moment? James Dean? Paul Newman? Pacino? We may never know. But we know enough, don't we? And now, onto my next obsession: How long till that hole is fixed?