Mon 13 May 2019 11:35:34 AM EDT Slept poorly last night. Went to bed at eleven, woke several times, and couldn't fall back to sleep after I woke at five. PTO from work. Eventually, slept from six-thirty to ten-thirty. High of fifty-three and overcast today. In the afternoon: twenty-minute nap and a ten-minute walk. Added to notes on Go templates. Worked on WoeDesk a little. Vacuumed, took out the trash. https://kottke.org/19/05/la-petite-danseuse-de-quatorze-ans > I’ve seen many representations of ballet dancers in Degas’ work over the years, but this time around was different because I had read Julia Wolkoff’s [The Sordid Truth behind Degas’s Ballet Dancers](https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-sordid-truth-degass-ballet-dancers) last year. > > The formerly upright ballet had taken on the role of unseemly cabaret; in Paris, its success was almost entirely predicated on lecherous social contracts. Sex work was a part of a ballerina’s reality, and the city’s grand opera house, the Palais Garnier, was designed with this in mind. A luxuriously appointed room located behind the stage, called the foyer de la danse, was a place where the dancers would warm up before performances. But it also served as a kind of men’s club, where abonnés — wealthy male subscribers to the opera — could conduct business, socialize, and proposition the ballerinas. > Young members-in-training of the ballet companies were called “petits rats” in reference to their often impoverished backgrounds. As Wolkoff observes of the subject of the sculpture: > > Marie van Goethem was the “petit rat” who posed for the sculpture, and she likely engaged in the sexually predatory economy of the ballet world to survive. Van Goethem disappeared from the public eye shortly after the sculpture was completed; after being late to a rehearsal, the Paris Opera Ballet dismissed her. The teenager probably returned home to follow in the footsteps of her mother — a laundress and likely prostitute — and older sister, who was also a sex worker. Twenty-minute walk in the afternoon. Saw a rabbit, and a plant with pink ♥-shaped flowers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamprocapnos > native to Siberia, northern China, Korea and Japan > Other common names include lyre flower, heart flower and lady-in-a-bath. Watched The Bishop's Wife on Netflix. OK. Good performance from Loretta Young. Servings: grains 7/6, fruit 3/4, vegetables 4/4, dairy 2/2, meat 0/3, nuts 0/0.5 Lunch: grilled cheese, tomato, banana, orange, coffee Afternoon snack: apple, salad Dinner: spaghetti with mushrooms 119/76