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A Writer's Tango

(I actually wrote this a couple of months ago, after missing a gancho lead and 2 boleo leads. In my defense, I had not actually learned either of those. This lovely leader was, after reading my blog, very excited to dance with me - and I with him. But I didn't have the chance to tell him how much of a beginner I was before we started dancing. He was sweet, and very polite - if not a bit puzzled by my performance.)

To my latest leader after our awkward first tanda:

Don't worry. I have to explain this all the time. My writing, in its quantity and emotion - seems to give the impression that I am an experienced dancer. I'm not. You could not have known that before we danced. I am an experienced listener of tango music - but not an experienced tango dancer.

I am a tango blogger, a tango reader, a tango pusher . . . because I am a tango dancer. I was a writer first, so I put everything I can't dance into words - and everything I can't write, I put into my dance.

Unfortunately (for my dance anyway) I write a great deal more than I dance. I wish that were not so at times.

I'd rather be dancing.

Everyone knows writers are peculiar. We take risks. We don't look both ways. We run with scissors. We go outside in the rain. We count our chickens before they're hatched.

We never hedge our bets.

And we never look before we leap - or how would we have the nerve to write anything?

We fall.
Truly. Madly. Deeply, we fall.

We open ourselves up to as many new and different lives as we can. We want to see from other eyes - different eyes.

Following, in this way, is perfect for me - so I can see the dance through your eyes. Through your body, your skin. I still see my dance - our dance, the dance we make together with the music and the floor and the dancers around us.

But in our connection, I can see a little bit through you.

A writer's dream.

Thank you for the dance.

Comments

Anonymous said…
The connection; what writing and tango are about, whether with ourselves, another, the music, the subject? And the better the connection...
July 8, 2009 at 2:39 PM
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