My Tango Diaries

Sometimes, I want the music that lies against my skin like silk. Cool, soft, there but not there. I can keep moving, in fact I have to move. Or I want the music that snaps sharp like canvas. Arcs, kicks, flashes. It moves me like a shock. Sometimes I want the music that covers me like lambswool, warm, soft and calm. Its substance lies in the pauses. the silence between notes, the air between threads. I move, but slowly. And sometimes . . . Sometimes I want the music I feel in my chest, like a clenched fist. and like a fist, It demands.

The beautiful stage and dance floor of Austin's historic Scottish Rite Temple, with chairs for the Prom King and Queen per the Prom Night Theme. I used to love tango festivals. At some point, I hope to love them again, but I think it may be a little while. Maybe in small, local milongas it's just that I have a little more time to (try to) remember the people I should remember. To say the things I wanted to remember to tell them, and concentrate on what they say to me. Now, I feel so much more awkward in my interactions with people - and the more people around, the worse it is. At Austin's Yolatango milonga Saturday night, I forgot people, faces, names, and even the context of where I should have recognized them from. Did I meet them in Dallas? Albuquerque? Denver? Here? Have we ever danced? Were they a client? Was I at Albuquerque's tango festival last year, or the year before? The venue, Austin's Scottish Rite Temple, was gorgeous, The music ...

Tango Bitch Mode  (image courtesy of Morguefile.com.) Warning:  This post is ranty This may be due to lack of cookies and coffee or it might not.  I want to question a few things that tango dancers have been posting on blogs, Twitter and Facebook comments, surveys etc.. There seem to be a few declarations of would-be t ango community solidarity, that don't seem (to me) to be all that much about community and solidarity. "We need to attract more dancers," when they really mean, "we need to attract more dancers that I want to dance with and who will dance with me." What makes me think this? If a dancer posts how disappointed, even cheated, they feel when there are too many of their role at a milonga and they don't get to dance, but then rejoice when the gender/role imbalance works in their favor -- I question how badly they really mean "attract more dancers."  Attracting more dancers to the scene because it's healthy for the ...

When people ask me why I haven't returned to tango, I answer that I've been too tired, and I've been in a lot of pain -- both of which are completely true. And yet those reasons tell the smallest part of the story. It's not just physical, but the rest is so hard to explain that I don't know where to start.  This is my attempt to try . . . For those of you for whom this is tl;dr - I do plan on returning to tango. It's just taking more time than I thought it would. Warning 1 : This is ridiculously long. See above. Warning 2: What I get from tango, what I look for, what I enjoy -- is personal to me. I'm not making any claim that it's the Holy Grail/authentic/One True Tango experience. It's what I, and a few others I've found, enjoy about the culture and the dance. That's the beauty and diversity of tango - it offers many different experiences for different people. As always, your mileage may vary. The Journey So Fa...