#tangothoughts

The place feels big, the floor even more. I've been watching people dancing for minutes and minutes. A friend still whispers advices to do the things right. It's time to go. I try to remember all the instructions. The arms, the feet, the whole body... There are so many details to think about. Maybe if I empty my mind... And then I hear the music. The direction is not on the floor, the direction is in the air. I wait for the good moment to catch the quick melody and I walk. One step after another, I follow this imposing guidance. The power of the tempo coming deep from my toes to my head is a musical flooding. It was just a first step.

I raise my hand as a second invitation and she moves closer. The distance is the same as before but the contact is unusual, a real pressure. But it's not the weight of her body but the weight of her presence which tells me I can't escape. I just accept it and reveal myself. One common breath as sign and we are ready to begin. I can feel her slow heartbeat against my chest when the music is still calm. Little by little, everything increases and we stop. At the end, nothing is calm anymore but I feel a soft serenity until we pull apart. It was just a first embrace.

The milonga hasn't yet started but she is already here. She puts on her shoes when no one is here to notice it (or if you were here, she escaped from your eyes). She is now waiting to dance. 

It is not because she arrived early that she is in need of dances. It's just her way to be sure to not miss the dance she wants. Just look in her eyes and you will read it clearly. 

She loves to listen to the music. It was her first contact with tango and she could not have imagined at that time, that she will be spending a night outside to dance with unknown people. 

She sits alone as she still doesn't know anyone. But she isn't closed. She looks at you and responds when you send a polite "hi". 

She gets an invitation and she goes without fear. The embrace seems nice, maybe a little distant. She follows the moves even if it is not perfect. After the dance, you know some guys will ask the leader how it was. Who would have guessed it was her first dance at a milonga ? 

If you knew her, you know she trained hard during months before going to the milonga. She doesn't follow the old Argentinian rules (she is not from the South) but it is just impossible for her to show a dance with weaknesses. That's also why she will not be forgotten. 

She stops to dance. "Thank you". It's enough for her. The emotion is here but she will not show it. She slowly goes to take her things and leaves the milonga. 

She will not come back before another couple of weeks as she found a lot of defects in her dance. She will train again to improve her dance. And dancers will have to wait.  

I will be honest and I am a little ashamed about what I will write. I can't remember the names of the people I danced with last week end. I met a lot of dancers during this event and even if I asked their names between the tandas or between some songs... the names flew away from my head.

I try sincerely to remember when someone tells me the name but I think my mind is too focused on the dance. However there is always one exception. Obviously I always remember the name of an exceptionally nice girl. But only one per event. Not more because two nice girls is already too much. 

I am less ashamed of this bad habit when I speak with other dancers. They have quite the same problem. It even becomes a good subject of discussion and the source of a lot of embarrassing situations.

We didn't organise a championship of the biggest mistake but we could all easily win as we all have stories with names: switch two names, forget one name in one song, asking three times the name in one tanda... There are so many possibilities to appear as an idiot. 

The night falls and a crazy idea appears. Let's go! Travelling for hours in the hope of one tanda, without preparing any plan. I am not even registered to the event. I call it crazy. And that is the first reaction of my tanguero friend when I phone him: "Seriously, it's crazy. Let's just go have a beer". And the same the tanguera I call responds: "It's already quite late you know". But after a few convincing words... they are IN. Their agendas were empty and after all they are a little crazy too.

The trip is long. More than four hours. But we have good music and a lot of gossip about tango people. We speak about the embraces of our favorite partners and we (men) add some comments about the curves. The tanguera tells us about the creepy guy from the other day and how she tried to avoid him during the milonga...without success. We speculate if some of our friends are together while they try their best to be undercover about their relationship. It is just so obvious sometimes. The improvised road trip is such a good moment and we know it will be even better when we will be there.

Last night, a tanguero told me the woman wearing the dark blue skirt is a calculating woman.

He was whispering some stories as she was dancing. He told me:

"If she comes to speak with you at a milonga, you can be certain that it's just because she wants to dance. She really doesn't care about your thoughts or ideas." (I let you imagine the tone...)

I didn't try to understand the reason that motivated him to "warn" me about this tanguera. Instead, I was rather wondering if there was someone here who was NOT calculating.

If you think about it though.. If you want to dance with someone in particular and if you don't/can't ask him or her to dance - you will surely have to find a way to attract and convince your dancing target. In this situation, everyone is calculating in their own way. You are even more calculating if you are trying to dance with the best dancers of the milonga and avoiding the bad dancers. 

As you know, there are more women than men in tango. This situation clearly doesn't help to fight the concept of "the calculating woman". Just think about how difficult it is to register for events like a tango marathon, where you have to find a partner several months before the event. Girls are sort of forced to be extra nice to guys if they want to participate.

To my experience, it isn't rare to discover a new "best friend" who wants to go to the grand marathon of the year. And then when you tell her you can't participate... She'll lose all interest in you. 

At a tango marathon, the situation is different because the parity is respected - in principle. As there is an equal number of girls and guys, the girls shouldn't need to do tricks to dance. However, it doesn't mean you can't still be confronted with some obvious "baiting" behavior (I'm not being paranoid here..) Like someone who's totally ignored you in the past, now approaches you as you were childhood friends. Possibly because she feels lost or alone in this new environment...

Arguably you might start doubting some women when you really don't have to. For example, when I spoke with Panther about one girl who for me is really kind - she asks for news and send warm messages -  she was for him just a calculating one (she asks for news and send warm messages..heh?).

Your own perception and personal relations with others are elements which will influence your thoughts.

I invited her without knowing what would happen. I don't remember the song. It doesn't matter. It could have been any tango, milonga or vals. The result would have been the same. This fact was confirmed by the numerous tandas we danced.

Every song improves the depth of our embrace. They all seem linked together. The end of a tango becomes the beginning of the next one. The silence doesn't exist as the beatings of our hearts and our breaths continue to play harmoniously even without music. An embrace so powerful the cortina can't break it. And time disappears.

It's a tango crush. 

We arrive to the end of the evening. We have to stop dancing. Everything is moving around us as the dancers are leaving the place but we can't move.

We are stuck like stones, while just a moment ago we were moving so gracefully across the dance floor. We don't speak. We don't need to.

And finally when we come back to our identities - we keep a part of the other.

We look each other in the eyes and we are still dancing.

I have to be honest, sometimes you dance with a woman just because you find her really attractive. 

For a few minutes - one tanda or more if it's going well - you'll be closer to her than after hours of pursuing her in a bar. 

To be close doesn't only mean you will stick your body against her and enjoy the superficial sensuality. (which is the initiating thoughts often appearing to anyone who thinks about the meaning of tango for the first time). It means that a real connection could allow you to discover some aspects of her personality. The embrace, the movement or the reactivity are indications giving you a first and often a true perception of the individual. 

When I dance with people I know, this perception is even more precise as I can feel if the follower had a bad day, if she's stressed or if she can't express her joy in the dance because she's carrying really bad news. 

On the other hand, you can find a woman so attractive that you feel it will be impossible to invite her to share a dance. Not that you are too shy to invite her. But you know you will not focus on your dance when you embrace her. 

I can't stop smiling when I think about a dancer saying he could not dance with a girl because of her "pornografic" embrace (his own words). And I've got to add that this was HIS perception. Because after I danced with this girl, I didn't find anything special about her embrace. Even if he is used to choose carefully and mostly dance with gorgeous girls, this specific girl was the type he categorized as "too attractive". He danced one tanda with her... and had to stop just after. I won't share too many details with you but in the end he couldn't manage to dance as relaxed as he wanted. 

The opposite can of course also happen with the followers. As the music flows, you all of a sudden feel as you are losing your partner. You can compare the feeling to dancing with a beginner who did a mistake and can't anymore focus on the dance because she keeps the mistake in her mind. And you just know that there's something else in her mind than only the dance. 

Yesterday, I saw a beautiful dancer at the milonga. I knew she was a beginner. Her original tattoo made her extra attractive... (blush)

I really wanted to invite her because I felt she was sitting too long. Sometimes, it's not easy to get invited when you are new in tango and new at the milonga.

It seemed to me that she didn't yet learn the cabeceo - because she didn't see the cabeceo I sent to her. So I go up and ask her directly. She doesn't say no. She tells me she will go and buy a drink in the bar and dance just after.

She goes to the bar and I wait while staring at the dance floor as she was doing a little while ago. Two minutes later, I see her heading to the floor with another guy.

I was quite disappointed and slightly irritated by the situation. Thinking about this now, I still don't know if she didn't want to say no in my face or if she didn't say no to the other guy.

From what I've heard and what I've understood, "No" is not an attack. "No" doesn't mean you don't like the guy.

Just think about the beginning of your tango journey as a tanguero when you got plenty of no's and it actually didn't kill you did it?

For tangueras it shouldn't be so hard to say this little word. "No" to an invitation, just means you are not in the mood to dance with this guy, with this music at this moment. It doesn't mean you will never dance with him. Because it would be stupid to be in this state of mind, right? Both for the girl and the guy. And the guy will understand. However, if you give a false reason to flee the dance, it could be a problem in the short or maybe long term future. I suspect I wouldn't be writing such a long note like this about a simple "No". This "No" made me think...

After all, I think the beautiful tanguera didn't want to dance with me. I am almost sure I didn't send an incomprehensible cabeceo because by now I'm quite confident my cabeceos work. I generally succeed inviting in this way.

I also have to admit that this traditional invitation sometimes provides more suspense than a vocal invitation.

You see, two weeks ago I wanted to dance with a tanguera. But she was speaking with her friends and totally unaware of everything surrounding her. 

We already exchanged glances during a few tandas but I felt it was not the right moment to dance with her until a tanda of milonga called us.

She smiles when hearing the first notes of the tanda. I feel her already moving and my feet were already stomping to the tempo on the floor.

Our eyes meet once again and I send a subtle nod as invitation and her eyes don't abandon mine.

This tanda was pandastic as you can imagine. The invitation became more than just a cabeceo. It became a preparation. A first connection out of time and space in the dance.

Thinking about this experience, I would from now on like to invite only with cabeceo.