Even the best relationships involve fragile moments. Is your life on the floor completely separate from your life and love off the floor? Do they bump into each other now and then?
We tend to treat our partners on the floor in the same manner as we treat them off the floor. If there are any sticky situations on the home front, they tend to follow us on to the floor and vice versa. Fasten your seat belt…tango can be a very bumpy ride, especially if one or the other is at all insecure or distrustful. Tango can break a relationship faster than you can hum the melody for, “It takes two…”
A cozy embrace can seem perfectly innocent from inside the frame, but may appear just a little too cozy to a significant other watching. We occasionally touch a partner with our chest, arms, legs, thighs, and and/or face, and may become entranced in the arms of someone who is more skilled on the floor than our life partner. We may profess that “it’s just dancing” but appearances may indicate otherwise and appearances can be deceiving and threatening.
Well-grounded, devoted couples take care of each other. They usually dance the first few sets together, dance with others, and connect again towards the end of the evening, or other combination of dancing together and dancing separately. Throughout the evening they communicate with a smile, touch or word. They allow each other the freedom to dance with whomever they wish, and some even sit completely apart from each other so the woman will more likely be invited to dance.
Some couples intend to dance only with each other or prefer being together until they gain enough confidence to dance with different partners. Staying together contributes to a couple becoming accustomed to each other’s every move, developing mutual bad habits, and preventing each from gaining valuable experience in adapting to various partners. By the time both partners are ready to branch out, their relationship may be strengthened, weakened or the same as it was when they began. However, somewhere along the way, there will likely have been a few of those moments that test our devotion and commitment, to each other and/or to the dance.
Some Tangoids keep their life partners out of the picture entirely. They know their non-dancing significant other will (or has been) bored, or worse, intimidated and envious watching their partner languish in the arms of those who can please him/her in ways they themselves cannot. Ouch.
And when all goes well, what could be more pleasurable than dancing our favorite dance with our favorite partner to great music…that is also appropriate for public viewing?
Polly's Tango Talk 