My Tango Diaries

For the first 10 or so months in my tango life, I had the unshakable, sometimes paralyzing, feeling that I was really only impersonating the woman I wanted to people to see. I was playing dress up in a real dancer's clothes. I was deeply afraid of being found out. Looking at myself in the mirror constantly reminded me I was trying to hide. I wanted so very much for others to see this person I'd made up, a confident, graceful dancer - not the woman I saw reflected back at me. The person I saw in the mirror was, and occasionally still is, caught in the picture of a stinging childhood epithet, "ugly, little geek." Whenever I looked in the mirror at my posture, or my walk, I'd ask myself who I thought I was kidding. What did I want to accomplish so badly? The phrase kept repeating in my head as I tried to look feminine, graceful and strong. Sometimes, though rarely now, it's still in there whispering in my ear . . . Ugly. Little. Geek. It was meant to be a playful...

Or, the hows and whys I became an a tango advocate . . . “When someone begins he can be dazzled by things that are external; the things of Tango are internal… A dancer arrives at the roots of the Tango when he falls in love…” - Eduardo Arquimba For those of you who already tango, I'm pretty sure this will be "preaching to the choir". For others who have not yet started tango, this is a bit about my journey and a bit more about what others are doing and saying about tango and pain management. Since I started this blog, I've had a dilemma. How much do I share of what is most personal about tango in my life. How much will my readers even care to know? After some discussion with a couple people in the tango community I've decided to share some of my personal experience as well as a few resources regarding how tango can have the power to change lives in one very specific way - in the management of chronic pain. Dance and music have always played a large role in my life...