Tango Distance Successfully Survives Close Embrace, Thrice!
Another studio was offering a close embrace class. DW gave me big doe eyes and batted her eyelashes at me and said she really wanted us to go. The instructor didn't have us switch partners for about 3/4 of the lesson. It started out going back to back. I have been taking open embrace classes for months, but close embrace was different enough it was like learning a new dance. Differences I noted included it felt heavier and slower, and it was harder for me to tell where the lady's feet were, like if she was crossed or not. I couldn't just glance down to see where the feet were placed. I have noticed paused steps (not sure the real name, where you pause in the middle of each step) seems to be much easier in close embrace, that shows to me there is more communication for that. Then the instructor announced "Switch partners!" It made it easier it was someone I knew from my home studio. We only did one switch. It's not really much of a story, I continued to do the lesson. I just focused on the business of doing what the instructor taught. A little instruction went a long way, DW and I can close embrace dance much better now. Business and a trip interfered with taking more of the classes.
I did bump into this instructor at a practica. We chatted for a bit and I told her I was not a touchy-feely kind of guy. We practiced a bit; she was very good. She then asked if we could practice close embrace. (Being smart #1, asking rather than just grabbing me.) We didn't even do any steps, we just briefly practiced the embrace. I have long arms and said that I felt I would reach around too far; she agreed and said I'd need to go a bit lower with my arm to prevent air gaps or reaching around too far. I'm also tall and it is a quite a reach for DW to get her arm comfortably vertical enough, so the instructor showed how DW could go to the side with her arm. Finally she said the class was teaching a particular kind of close embrace, but that many people prefer what she showed to be another close embrace -- about as close as you can get without touching torsos. She kept things short (Being smart #2). We then did some high speed open embrace Milonga – she made me look very good and seemed to honestly enjoy it.
BTW she told me close embrace is a tough sell, that she has learned to announce it well in advance. Once she just sprung it on a class, and four people walked right out!
I told my usual instructor about my success (he is one of the few people I have told about this thread). He gave me a high five.
I know I'll be enjoying close embrace with DW. I'm not planning to do close embrace with others at Milongas, but I'm planning to stick through it in class when we get there in my studio.
P.S. Tango distance does close embrace thrice! “Not planning” and “not doing” can be two different things! I went to a Milonga. For this Milonga, typically there are enough ladies that I can dance with ½ of them. This allows some triage and allows selecting a subset. This particular night it was close to as many ladies as tandas, but had quite the shortage of men. I try to avoid dancing with the same lady twice (DW excepted!) unless there are more Tandas than ladies. It worked out that I danced with several of the expert ladies that I had avoided before. I presumed they would rather dance with someone below their skill level than sit. Expert lady #1 started to pull me into a close embrace but stopped when I wasn't reciprocating. It was a great dance, she was every good. Expert lady #2 started to pull me in. I explained I hadn't really been schooled in close embrace. She looked disappointed but stepped back. It was another great dance, it is amazing how these older experienced ladies can read my mind, even when I make a mistake! Expert lady #3 is an instructor for another studio. I mention this only as it is relevant to the story: She is old enough to be my mother, wait, no, make that my grandmother. She immediately pulled me in. I explained I had had only a single close embrace class and didn't really know enough to do close embrace. I guess I was too apologetic in my tone... Apparently she took the tone in my voice to mean I was deeply disappointed I didn't know how to do close embrace yet but was anxious to learn. She drew an imaginary figure on her body, and then mine, and said those are the areas we want to touch. Then she grabbed me and slammed our bodies together. That age thing, that age thing... Tango Distance was raised to respect his elders... Had it been a younger lady I think I would have said something. Instead I obeyed my elder and started moving forward, just walking. It was probably this poor lady's most boring dance ever. She tried to teach me a couple of things, but it just wasn't clicking... What does “step between” mean? Step between beats? Step between her feet? With which foot? Switch between parallel and cross systems? There isn't room for that! So, the on-the-spot close embrace lesson wasn't great, but I calmly stuck it out. That's amazing progress for me. I even calmly received the three brief hugs she gave me at the end!
After that I ran over to my instructor, who has read this thread and knows about all Tango Distance's idiosyncrasies. Humorously, I asked him if he saw how that lady over there made me do close embrace? And look! She's doing it to that guy, too!
Serious Tango question: If the verbal approach fails, is there a dance way to communicate to open the embrace? I see others switch styles dynamically, so there must be some trick to it.
