That was a long tango high! But what goes up …

Today’s lesson with Mariano wasn’t a full-on tango crash. It wasn’t like I couldn’t do anything any more. But I just wasn’t feeling it. My movement felt clumsy. I was getting mixed up with a simple sequence of steps (a new-to-me form of ocho cortado). My pace was off. And I was really inconsistent …

For example, Mariano showed me how to make the rebound a smaller and snappier movement. The explanation and demo made perfect sense, and I was quickly able to get the right feel. Then two goes later I was right back to where I started. Then a good one. Then not. All completely random.

At the end of the 45-minute lesson, I didn’t feel I was any closer to a snappy ocho cortado than I had been before it.

Some stuff worked. I’d been finding it awkward to switch between inside and outside walking in close embrace, and Mariano helped me address that. I was also getting a good sense of the interconnectedness of everything, and how different elements of different figures can be combined in different ways. But generally, when it came to actually doing any of it, I was all over the place.

But that’s tango. Some days it all works, other days not so much. Having been through the cycle before, I’m pretty relaxed about it now. Tomorrow is a new day, and a new lesson.

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