Beware of the Dance Floor Hazard

The other day, to appease the continual urging of a friend, I dragged my ponderous carcass out to a tango dance class.  There were forwards and backwards and lefts and rights, but mostly there were ups and downs.

Those who know me are aware that I used to be a fairly good dancer.  I spent several years (and a lot of green) at an Arthur Murray studio in Denver perfecting my style in swing dances (triple-time, West-Coast, hustle), Latin dances (rumba, cha-cha, samba, bolero) and waltz.  Occasionally we dabbled in things like foxtrot, American tango, salsa and country two-step. 

We had amateur competitions – Showcases – where we competed in the standard dances and where many of us did special “show dances” that we had choreographed and practiced for months.  I raked in quite a collection of blue ribbons (first place).  I was pretty good.

But that was a long time ago.  A lot has changed.  And that was made abundantly clear to me this week.

Age has caught up with me and injected nasty little aches into many of my moving parts.  And this has been exacerbated by my own penchant the past few years to eat a lot of crap and then let it settle into the most unseemly places while I spend hours in front of this very computer becoming one with my chair.  The extra pounds (or kilos, if you prefer) do not seem to help with anything at all.

Now, Argentine tango is pretty different from the Latin dances I used to do.  It consists of graceful, flowing motions, as opposed to the active movements of cha-cha, samba, salsa, etc.  In a lot of ways, rumba comes close, but it still has a lot of differences.  But tango IS a dance, so there are some things that are constant: you need rhythm, you need to stay on the balls and toes of your feet, you need to keep your weight shifting from foot to foot and not be “planted” on both feet, and you need balance.

I had problems with all of those things.  It was not a pretty sight.

My lack of balance was particularly upsetting, and I attribute this mainly to the weight I am carrying.  I remember my balance being quite good in the old days of dancing.  Balancing on one leg in certain positions and steps was never a problem.  I remember of my choreographed show routines in which I came up from a dip on just one leg while supporting the weight of my partner as well.  It was perfect.

Can’t do anything like that now.  Even with just my own weight, I’d topple over.

I can tell that my leg strength has really diminished, which also has to be contributing to the balance problem.  I've had lower-back, knee and ankle problems in recent years, which certainly don’t help.  It makes it hard to be on my toes and support myself on one leg at a time, and this throws off my balance.  When I am firmly planted on both feet (with at least 18 inches between them), I feel reasonably confident that I can stay upright – even on a marshrutka (local bus).  But anything less than that can be hazardous.

To make matters even worse, it was warm in the studio and I was sweating like a nervous pig in the hot sun… after eating green chili.  That was pretty embarrassing.

And worse still – it’s a dance studio, so there were big mirrors around the place.  Nowhere to hide.

So, what to do?  For a while, I had a feeling that I had made a huge mistake going to the class, that I was just making a fool of myself and should accept that the mojo is gone.  But I don’t think I am going to give up so easily.  I’ve been doing a lot of that for the past four or five years, and I’m rather tired of it.

This is not going to be easy.  But maybe that’s why I really need to stay with it.  PerhapsI can use this as a kind of turning point.  Maybe it will help me to turn around some other things as well.  If nothing else, it can’t hurt… unless I fall and break something.

I am going to work on this and give it a chance.  It seems like it might be good medicine.  Stay tuned!