Proof, if it was needed, that my neural pathways are well and truly blocked comes from the fact that I am finding it impossible to get my head around Sunday being Monday. Today (Monday), for example, feels like Tuesday and I woke up thinking about all the things I am doing Tuesday. Because yesterday (Sunday) I was in the office.

When I first realised my week was about to start a day earlier I just thought ‘oh that’s fine, it’s a day earlier, I’ll easily cope with that’. But no. I am like a senile old person constantly having to ask people what day it is and wondering if tomorrow will be a work day or the weekend.

That’s the other complicating factor. Friday is the new Sunday. And Saturday is like, well, Saturday at home.

Good news from Leo. He declared his day at school yesterday “much more better” but still misses his teacher from home and of course Louis or Los as he writes his name. But he does have a friend, a Canadian boy called Oscar who also showed up in tears yesterday so they bonded, especially after they were told they have “the right” to speak English together by Leo’s teacher. His ballet class went very well, he showed me the moves last night and I think he’s a shoe-in for the Royal Ballet School.

The girls start their ballet tomorrow (Tuesday) and not today as I was convinced when I woke up this morning and prepared their kit. I can’t wait. I have also signed up for a class called vertical flex dancing - yes I had to ask what it was as well……Heaven knows what day of the week it is on, but I have until September 30th to work it out.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

I am hoping I have hit the low point. After yet another night of no sleep, a bean-bag exploding all over Amanda’s flat and no response from my high-powered contact, I was told the ballet class I wanted the girls to go to was full. I did what any normal balletomane would do and burst into tears, then I thought about calling Etihad and arranging flights back to France. But decided against it due to the fact that the ballet class there is probably full as well.

Then a knight in shining armour appeared in my inbox. It’s amazing how emails can change your life. He is involved in property in Abu Dhabi and had read my tale of woe in the Sunday Times. I am not going to say too much about it for fear of jinxing it, but the flat is perfect, the location divine and the rent, although astronomical, totally normal for here.

An hour or so later I had a call. “Madame Helena? This is the Expressions of Dance studio,” said a friendly voice. “Are you still interested in your girls joining the Grade I ballet class. We have two places.”

“Interested?!!!” I leapt so high I hit my head on the roof of the taxi. It turns out one girl had pulled out, the head of the school didn’t want to offer a place to one sister and not the other so asked the ballet teacher if she would, just this once, take eleven girls instead of ten. She agreed. I love her. It seems ridiculous that something like a ballet class can change your whole outlook but it has.

You’ll be pleased to hear that Leo is starting too, on Sunday. His kit has been ordered, white leotard and blue shorts. But he too has hit a low point poor little love. After his first day of school I asked him how it went.

“It’s my worst school ever,” he told me. “I didn’t make any friends and they don’t speak English.”

He is sleeping peacefully as I write. When they all wake up we will take them to the Club where there are activities all day(it’s the weekend here) from Nintendo Wii (whatever that is) to cooking to tennis and bouncy castles. This is an amazing place for children and last night as I watched him and the girls play on the beach I thought that things must get better for him as well just as they have for me. Especially once he discovers ballet…..

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

When Zelda Fitzgerald (wife of F. Scott) was 27 she took up ballet. Not in any casual way you understand, like someone of a certain age might take up golf, but obsessively. She became totally focused on a career as a ballerina, training for up to eight hours a day.

When I took the girls to ballet on Saturday and went into the little office at the dance school to discuss plans for the new school year when Leonardo will start, the school secretary suggested I should do a class too and then they’d have the whole family.

“Oh it’s too late for me,” I said, the unfortunate Zelda always being at the back of my mind (she died in an asylum).

“You’ve danced before haven’t you?” said Bea’s teacher who also happened to be in the room.

I nodded, unable to tell him that yes, I did once do a few evening classes in Kensal Rise, and have spent many happy hours jumping around pretending to be Margot Fonteyn, but that is about it.

“Well, it will all come back, you’ll see. Come Wednesday mornings when you bring the children.”

The matter was settled. I was unaccountably happy, I felt like I’d been given a huge diamond or been told that pink is indeed the new black, but I was also very nervous. How stupid will I look come September when I can’t even force my feet into fifth position. The image of Miss Piggy dancing with Rudolf Nureyev on the Muppet Show replaced poor Zelda.

Olivia suggested she give me a lesson to prepare me. We happen to have a ballet bar in the house (OK I may not actually have done much ballet but I can still obsess, can’t I?) and we spent an hour and a half prancing around. I thought I did OK. Olivia did not.

“Mummy, are you a robot?” she shouted at me on several occassions. “Mummy, I think you’ll be the worst in the class,” was her conclusion.

So it seems if I am to avoid humiliating myself and my children I will have to adopt a Zelda-style approach to this. Eight hours a day minimum. I’m not quite sure how I will do any work or the ironing or cook any meals. But maybe if I go as mad as Zelda did, I simply won’t care.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

Last night we went to the ballet to see Swan Lake, performed by the Kiev Ballet at a venue called The Zenith in Montpellier. My suspicions should have been roused when the tops of our water bottles were confiscated by security guards on the way in. Why? I asked.

“There are people who throw bottles at the stage,” I was told. “If the top is off they don’t travel so far.”

This was clearly not going to be like any ballet I had ever been to. At Covent Garden the audience might murmur their disapproval at a false step or you might even get the odd polite cough, but a water bottle as a missile? Most unlikely.

“Let’s go and have a glass of champagne,” I said to Mary once we were through security. No, my suitcase has not arrived but we had managed to feed ourselves and our four children for a total of twenty euros at IKEA so were feeling like we could splash out (pardon the pun) a little.

More disappointment. There was not a champagne bar in sight. What was on sale, however, was a selection of pizzas, fizzy drinks and dreadful-looking baguettes filled with ham.

We went into the auditorium. It looked more like the venue for a giant rave than a ballet. The seats were plastic and instead of chandeliers we had scaffolding.

I am pleased to report though that the ballet was divine. They were perfect. No reason to hurl a water bottle, empty or otherwise. The first sight of the corps de ballet all in white running onto the stage made the whole thing totally worthwhile. Odette/Odile was fantastic; innocent and graceful as Odette, naughty, humorous and totally seductive as Odile. Even the prince, whom I normally find too tedious, was impressive. Although the girls were a little surprised to see a man wearing tights and showing “all his bits”.

As we left I was in a haze of tutus and pirouettes. I hoped the girls had loved it as much as I did.

“Did you like it?” I said to Bea.

“Yes,” she said. “But we didn’t see any swans.”

There is no pleasing some people…..

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

It was one of those few moments in life when the reality was better than the fantasy. Yesterday the girls started their ballet classes. I was so nervous about arriving late we were there an hour and a half before the beginning. We wandered around for a while and then went to the school.

It is called the Skouratoff Studio and is in a small back-street in a part of Montpellier you have never heard of and wouldn’t really want to visit. It has two studios, one that looks out on the street. It was here I witnessed the obsession begin. Olivia and Bea stood totally transfixed watching a class of teenagers dance. It was a magical moment. I almost wept with joy.

Then it was their turn. They looked divine in their little pink tutus, hair up in a bun and ballet shoes. I wasn’t allowed to stay and watch but they came out beaming, telling me they wanted to join the more advanced class. Since coming home they have talked about nothing else and done practically nothing else. As I write they are leaping around upstairs. Bea incidentally is a very good jumper according to the teacher. I have to say the transformation in Olivia after just one lesson is astounding. She now looks like a ballerina.

As for me, well I did ask about the adult courses and there are lots of them, for all levels. I am sorely tempted but Rupert warns me that Zelda Fitzgerald tried to become a ballet dancer just before she went mad.

Maybe I’d better stick to watching the girls. In my case the fantasy is probably better than the reality.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008