Tango and Trust

Have you ever heard the expression “it takes two to tango?”  Well, now I believe it.

I used to think that if one wanted to learn any dance style, tango included, one needed only to practice…with or without a partner.  You can always dance with an imaginary partner, I figured.

Not true.

This past Saturday I got to attend a milonga for the first time.  A milonga is a tango social dance.  I don’t know much about it yet, but I’m learning bits and pieces.  For example, when a gentleman asks a lady to dance, it is customary to dance three songs together in sequence, called a “tanda.”  At the end of each tanda, the music plays a “cortina” (curtain) in a different musical style, to signal the end of the tanda.  If a partner says, “Thank you” at the end of one of the songs but before the final song of the tanda, it is a polite way to say that they don’t want to dance the rest of the tanda with that dance partner. 

I learned this last point of tango etiquette in an amusing way.  I was blessed to have some fabulous dancers ask me to dance even though I was a complete newbie.  After one dance with a gentleman with an excellent sense of rhythm (who turned out to be a drummer—that explained it!), I had enjoyed myself so much that at the end of the dance, I instinctively exclaimed, “Thank you!” simply to express my gratitude for the dance.  He cocked his head and with a confused look asked, “Do you want to keep dancing?”  “Oh, I’m enjoying myself tremendously.  I’d keep dancing as long as you wanted to!” I answered, with great gusto.  He grinned widely and explained the point of etiquette.  Mortified, I apologized profusely.  He laughed and assured me, “I thought you might not have meant it that way.  That’s why I asked.”

What I discovered in the course of the evening was that tango is all about trust and the art of connection.  It is all about the communication between the leader and the follower.  He must take bold, decisive steps so that she can feel where they’re going.  She must pay attention to his cues, his hand placement, the way he is angling her.  She must relax in his arms and let him lead her.  She must trust him, because she is almost always dancing backwards, blindly, and with no idea what is the next sequence of moves that he has in mind.  But if he is a strong leader, she can trust him and enjoy the surprise of what enfolds.  I felt this connection, this communication so much more with some partners than with others.  My greatest delights were the moments when something happened that was unexpected to me but that my partner had apparently planned out, and he softly muttered, “goo-ood.”  But since I’m a tango newbie, all too often I would realize too late that I had missed a cue.  Thankfully, one excellent dance partner in particular, who took great pains to explain moves to me and teach me, also had a gracious way of reacting to my errors: he would silently smile when I missed my cues.  My only correction was the good-natured curl of his lips, but it gently gave me all the feedback I needed, and we tried again until I heard the soft, “goo-ood.”

The relationship between a man and a woman, or a husband and a wife, has often been compared to a dance.  As I reread the previous paragraph, I can certainly see some helpful parallels and life lessons for these relationships.  Life works best with a strong leader and an attentive follower.  Two leaders would not work well together, nor would two followers.  We are not created identical but complementary, each with a special role to play.  God, may you bless me with a dance partner for life itself, and may we move in one accord, with gentleness and trust.  As we grow on the dance floor of life, may we be patient and gracious with one another, so that we might enjoy the process of becoming more and more one, creating a beautiful, unified, living, moving work of art.