Lucky

The Great Bob Wills

After the Sunday milonga last night, our usual place to eat and wind down, our Argentine friend was talking with us about the great milonguero Alberto Dassieu.  There is an interview, very touching, informative, and relevant to tango history, which is going around the YouTube now and you could find it at PractiMilonguero.

Our friend reflected on his own life in tango, and said how lucky he is.  He speaks the language, grew up in Buenos Aires, and has many milongueros in his home, fed them, assisted them and interpreted for them in  workshops and private teaching in our city.  He knows them. So yes, he is lucky for the coincidence of his birth and also for his own ability to work and network so that he, and all of us, can study with some milongueros before they are gone.

But I think about this:  I am not them.  They don't want us to be them.  And we can't be them.  We share the tango with them, and now of course, tango is global, and you can find a real milonguero in your own backyard who has never been to Buenos Aires.  It appears that the spirit can be channeled in rare instances.  But, we are not Argentine.  We cannot say we learned from our childhood barrio to dance this or that way of tango.

So who are we, and how can we bring all of ourselves to the tango floor? 

I grew up in cattle ranching and timber country.  The ranches of my uncles (Hereford cattle) and the ranch of my grandad, (dairy, cattle, and a few elite race-horses), were not herb farms, no lavender  fields or massages.  Dust, manure, barbed wire, blood, and men with cigars and suntans that stopped in mid forehead.  A rodeo was a working sport.  Cattle put in the corral and restrained for branding, medicine, and other things you don't want to hear about. 

My family loved music.  Bob Wills, Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn..

Some of the family played instruments and an uncle and aunt travelled around playing in country places where people danced.
Sometimes there were grange dances.  This was country before country was cool, which still exists, now that country is not cool.  My beautiful Aunt Mimi played the piano at home.  Lots of soulful country, just like tango if you know the words, and sometimes the music makes you dance, while the words make you cry.

Later I spent too much time two-stepping when I should have been paying more attention to my kids.  I loved country bars, knew all the dances, and had a wonderful time.  I had my same dance partner then.  It was not as soulful maybe as tango, and certainly lacked the social stratification that goes on.  It's America after all.  If we have a country dance competition, most real country dancers won't be there.  They will be at work.  But they sure as hell would not deny anyone from any country the opportunity to scoot their boots.

I keep of gorgeous photo of fiddlers at the Willows Oregon fruit stand above the console where I put my computer to play all my tango music.  It reminds me of who I am, where my barrio is, and most of all it reminds me that I am lucky.