My Tango Diaries

Most of our assumptions have outlived their uselessness . Marshall McLuhan Tuesday at Texas French Bread Milonga with Glover Gill Glover Gill at Texas French Bread Bakery's Tuesday Milonga As always, I had so many wonderful dances with generous, gifted and warm-hearted tangueros at TFB. What is it about that place that brings such a beautiful feeling? I was in a state of joy from just about beginning to end. A tall tanguero arrived from out of town. We had danced before, but I was a little bit greener then. (Okay, I'm still green...) I couldn't quite remember - did we dance close? Was I still keeping my distance then? Seems like ages ago . . . He asked with a nod, and I accepted. At the edge of the crowded dance floor, he offered his close embrace. I wonder if he noticed I was relieved. The music started and in a moment I found it - the sweet spot on his chest. I could hear the music through him. Even the crazy Santana piece later. (Things get a little wild tow...

"So, pick and choose. Improvise. Hide away. Run after them. Stay still. Move at an astonishing speed. Shut up. Scream a rumor. Turn around. Go back without returning. Upside down. Let your feet do the thinking. Be comfortable in your restlessness. Tango." Tango and the Political Economy of Passion by Marta E. Savigliano Something is up, but I don't know what. I'm restless. I'm writing, but nothing is good enough lately. Nothing comes out the way I want it to. With my friends, I'm either reaching out or pulling away, but never still. I'm dancing more because I'm having such a hard time writing. I want to dance until the buzzing in my head goes quiet. All my thoughts feel like white noise with no content - like the scrolling headlines on the news channels. It's all important, so none of it is. There's just too much. No more excuses . . . At least there's one more tiny victory. I no longer start every tanda with a new leader with t...

Freeing the Free Leg Almost no one changed partners at last night's practica so I worked a great deal with one gentleman in particular, which turned out to be a great opportunity. This gentleman tends to lead a lot of movements that count on the follower's free leg truly being free - displacements, small and fluid volcadas and the like - so I got to really work on that aspect that's been so hard for me. After the second song I was finally able to relax my unweighted leg by default instead of trying to relax it when I realized the lead required it to be relaxed. The more I was able to relax that free leg - the easier it was for me to then work on an even harder technique issue . . . Relaxing my hips . . The trick with relaxing my hips is that they don't generally feel tense or tight. I've even caught myself saying, 'they are relaxed!' when a leader or teacher has tried to work with me on that. It wasn't until I started working with Daniela Arcuri in he...

Technically the milonga wasn't accidental - my attendance was. I had every intention of going to the UT practica and practicing any and all of the wonderful things I learned in my lessons. I went to the building and everything! As I walked up to the Student Union with another tango dancer - a fire alarm was set off. The building was evacuated and no one was allowed back in. Obviously the tango gods did not want to me to go to the practica. So we all climbed into various vehicles (thank you A.P.!) and caravaned over to the Texas French Bread milonga (which was already enjoying a pretty nice turnout.) Once we filed in, the number increased by another third or so which made for a very festive atmosphere. Even though, in my excitement, I forgot nearly everything I learned in my lessons - it was an absolutely amazing milonga. I need practice, I really do - but in the middle of the week, when the next (weekend) milonga seems so very far away, I think I need this milonga more. So, for me...

A post by Virtualapiz, "Are we talking about the same thing?" sums up a bit of where I am right now. Doubts, work stresses, anxiety from my non-tango life are filtering into my dancing. And I catch myself wondering, does my leader see/feel this dance the way I do? I enjoy dancing with him , but does he enjoy dancing with me ? Am I weighing down his shoulder? Pulling him off his axis? Giving back enough energy? When I first started tango, I didn't know enough to know how badly I was doing. In that state - I was completely open to the experience - to everything anyone would teach me. It seems now that I know just enough to doubt everything else. As another tango blogger quoted from the book, The Shack - in the beginning, I was in a state of expectancy - not expectation . Now I catch myself constantly questioning - shouldn't I be better than this by now? Shouldn't I be able to push my leg back further by now? Should I still be missing cross leads? Why am I still ti...

More fears faced which led to more dancing than I ever thought I could do in one day. Classes, practica, milonga - all the way til the end. Eight hours. I danced with leaders I had been too intimidated to dance with before. And, I danced with my few familiar favorite leaders - from whom I not only learn so very much, but make me feel safe and comfortable in their embrace. I danced with new leaders I'd never met and learned more still. Of course I still stumbled, faltered, missed leads . . . apologized. I questioned my steps, my axis, my embrace . . . I had to be reminded to breathe, to collect my ankles, to shift weight... and again to breathe... But I never questioned what it was to be there and dance. As other tangueras noted, the pain doesn't really hit until you stop dancing. I was fine even through the car ride home. You can only delay the inevitable so long, though. I slept most of Sunday. The bottoms of my feet were bruised and blistered. I felt like I had weights tied ...

"Because I have no answers to my questions, I tango. I tango because I have to move in the midst of these uncertainties. . . . " Tango and the Political Economy of Passion, Savigliano There is something going on, but I don't know what. Everything makes me want to cry. Happy things, sad things, irrelevant things. Maybe it's hormones. Maybe it's lack of sleep. Maybe it's both. All I know is that I'm becoming increasingly self conscious - expending extra effort to keep the world at bay while I work this, whatever it is, out. I find comfort in tango as usual in dancing, in listening, in watching. Breathe in. Breathe out. Tango. se llama tango y nada más. I come home from practicas and milongas tired - the good tired of exertion and excitement wearing off. Not the tired-to-my-bones sort of weary that I am throughout most of the day. I am tired. Maybe that's all that this is. Tired of lab tests that give me the whats but not the whys. Tired of battling insu...

UPDATE: I got an email from someone who was there and she told me I shouldn't feel so bad about my leading performance. So, on her suggestion, I upgraded it to "not so great actually" from the previous title. Last Tuesday, as there was the usual shortage of men in my beginner tango class, I had to (attempt to) lead. I've been (well, you could call it) dancing tango about 2 months. I can barely follow, but it would be good to see a bit of the other side, right? Right. My partner looked irritated. She seemed irritated that there weren't enough men in the class and she was going to be lead by a woman. She also seemed irritated that we were all (well, mostly all) truly beginners, while she was more intermediate. The class was too slow. I tried not to be intimidated, thought about how I liked/disliked different aspects of being led, and tried to go forward from there. Well, not so much forward, as shifting weight side to side. Was she with me? uh..no.. hmm.. Maybe she ...

Intermediate student to me (a beginning student, of course, at practica): wow, that's a really cool thing you do with your hips. Me: Pardon? Him: That thing, with the ochos and your hips. Me: Um... I'm pretty sure I'm not supposed to be doing that. (Trying to remember what I was doing. Also trying to remember fix my posture, maintain my axis, pull in my center, keep my feet on the floor, and the 100 other things I'm supposed to be doing during ochos - that don't include whatever it was I was doing with my hips.) Him: It wasn't a bad thing. Me: *snicker* It's leftover from belly dancing I think. (At least that's what I'm going to tell myself, since I don't have a clue what the heck I was doing.)