Leaving Mexico: the Last Danzón, Tonight!
I have to leave in a week, but I’m going out with a bang!
With the clock ticking before my impending departure from Mexico, it happened.
With just days to prepare, I got pulled into performing a complicated new couple’s dance routine in front of an audience—something I’d never done before.
Sure, why not?
They say, ‘Dance like no one is watching,” but what if everyone IS watching?
Against my brain’s better judgment, my mouth had agreed to be Paloma’s partner for danzón, a courtly traditional Latin dance that dates back hundreds of years.
I expected to have weeks to learn danzón, but in my second week, our instructor, Salvador, said, ‘I have exciting news! We are going to perform a new danzón routine on Friday!” I could barely mimic his moves
Exciting? This is terrifying!
I turned to Paloma and said, “Friday, as in three days from now? But I don’t know the new routine! We just started learning it today!”
Always practical, Paloma looked at me, shrugged, and said, “Well, you’ll just have to learn it. We can practice at my house.”
Which is what we did for the next three days.
Nonstop.
When I got to her house to practice, she would start the music and say, “Remember to …”
But we were standing so close… I couldn’t concentrate. For the last four years, as a full-time van lifer, this was the closest I’d been to a human female.
My heart thought she said, “Oh, forget about dancing. Kiss me!”
I was about to say, “My thoughts exactly…” Then I heard her voice.
“Are you listening to me?” she asked. “What did I just say?”
She looked cross.
I was going to say, “‘Kiss me.’” But my brain told me she didn’t say that.
She sighed and rolled her eyes as if to say, “What is the matter with this gringo?”
Friday morning arrived too soon.
The panic button had been going off for three days as I stumbled and fumbled along.
Here we were, at the senior center, in front of a crowd of about 150 seniors from Sahuayo, a small town an hour away, awaiting our turn as the opening act of the day’s celebration.
In addition to three busloads of seniors, there were elected officials from Patzcuaro and Sahuayo. photographers, and the staff of the two senior centers.
No pressure.
I checked the time. It was noon. Mealtime for the visitors.
After they ate lunch, we would be the first to dance.
And it would be the last danzón before I left town. In my head, I heard the melody of Donna Summer’s disco hit, “Last Dance” from 1978.
I wanted to get it over with, but the meal dragged on. The seniors idly twisted their tortillas into soup-sopping tornillos and slurped up spoonfuls of spicy pozole.
We stood there, I in my new white shirt, black pants, and dress shoes, and Paloma in a traditional gauzy white dress and sparkly, red high-heeled dance shoes.
“Why me, God?” I asked, looking up to the heavens. “I have never learned a complicated dance routine, much less performed one.”
Finally, we got the signal; it was time.
We lined up, all six of us.
There were three couples: Paloma and me, and two more experienced couples, Salvador, our instructor, dancing with Luz, and Irma and Armando.
The music started.
We counted four beats and marched to our starting positions. As the marimbas played the tune Veracruz, by the group Marimba Chiapas, we listened for our cue.
We had about three minutes to complete 132 dance steps without a mistake.
On our beat, we began to dance.
Or should I say that she danced; I was half in the dance, and half in a trance.
I held Paloma’s right hand in my left; my right hand cradled her waist. Up close, her dark eyes were captivating. Her dainty hand, nestled gently in my big mitt, felt soft and warm. Her left hand rested on my right shoulder.
‘Ignore all of that,” my brain said. ‘It will distract you.”
No kidding.
I felt like a starving man dancing with a hot, fresh donut. It smelled wonderful, but I couldn’t look at it, much less taste it.
I stared straight ahead.
My first major obstacle was the lateral adorno, a side-to-side bit, which started with us facing each other and taking six steps, each one on the beat, to my left.
On seven, I had to step forward on my left and tap my right toe behind me. As I stepped forward, Paloma held her breath and closed her eyes.
I knew why.
When we practiced, I usually leaned too far forward on my left foot and got off balance. But now, somehow, I maintained my balance, and we danced on.
She looked up at me and smiled sweetly.
A lovely smile! My heart soared.
Our routine continued.
Soon, the next dreaded moment of danger approached.
In the paseo, we marched forward six steps, and Paloma did her pirouette, then we began to march backwards six steps, after which I had to do a man-spin on seven.
I gritted my teeth.
In our practice sessions, the spin move snuck up on me like a thief in the night, pulling a black hood over my head and stealing my sense of direction and timing.
I had to figure out what was screwing it up each time.
After watching a videotape of Salvador doing the full turn in slow motion, over and over, I finally made sense of the spin. I had to do a quarter turn on each step.
Just before my spin move, a thought popped into my head. “I have not made a single mistake!” As I was thinking that, I stopped thinking about our routine.
It was time for my spin. But I wasn’t spinning!
Panicking, Paloma spat out, “Go! Spin!” She gave me a firm shove to the left.
“Oh, yes,” I said, snapping out of my reverie, not sure if I had enough time left to do it.
I went to the left in a peculiar crouching position, like Groucho Marx doing his Captain Spalding, the African Explorer who had shot an elephant in his pajamas.
Somehow, I got back from my hunting expedition in time for her to do her final pirouette. (Mercifully, no video of my most grievous gaffe exists)
We finished our routine without further incident.
On the last two beats, side by side, we all stepped forward and “closed” our feet. Posición final. The performance was over.
The music stopped, and the applause began. The audience, which had mysteriously vanished during our routine, reappeared in front of us.
I looked sideways at Paloma, smiled, and said, “Sorry. My fault.”
She smiled and said, in a surprised tone, “That was pretty good!”
Maybe she was proud of me. Maybe I’d get a nice big hug.
But first, we bowed to the audience.
***
As soon as we exited the stage area, she let go of my hand and sprinted across the grass in her red high heels to a room on the other side of the courtyard.
No hug. I stood there and hung my head, feeling a bit let down.
I glanced at my fellow choir members sitting nearby. They shrugged as if to say, “You messed up. No wonder she ran off.”
About five minutes later, she and about 20 other women came out of the room wearing brightly colored, long folklorico dresses, their hair up in buns.
Aha. They were on next! She had run away for a quick change of outfits.
Unlike our subdued danzón routine, their performance was amazing!
They did zapateado, the rapid foot-stamping dance reminiscent of Spanish flamenco. They twirled and swished their skirts up and down and side to side.
Their dance was colorful, electric, and riveting to watch!
By comparison, our dance had been a snoozer. But that might be a plus. Maybe the audience had fallen asleep. Maybe nobody had seen me make my mistake.
Just then, a buddy of mine from the choir came up to me and shook my hand.
“Muy bien, mi hermano,” he said. Aha. So, he didn’t see my mistake!
“Too bad about that mistake,” he said, giving me a pat on the back. “But don’t worry about it. No one even noticed it.”
Which meant that everyone noticed it.
Oh, well. I tried.
***
The last danzón was over; my big day was done.
My time in Mexico is coming to an end. I have to leave in a week before my temporary vehicle import permit expires, ending my six-month stay here.
What a visit!
I had joined a choir, learned Mexican songs, and made new friends. I became Paloma’s danzón partner and did not cause a total disaster at the show.
It‘s sad to leave, but I have some great memories to keep me company on the long drive back to the US, about 1,200 miles to the border through six different Mexican states.
When I reach the US border, the Customs and Immigration official will ask me if I have anything to declare.
I’m going to say, “Yes, I had a great time in Mexico.”
When I got down here, I was just another lonely, retired old man, but the dancing and the singing and friendship made me feel young and energized and alive again.
Maybe you should visit Patzcuaro. But watch those spin moves. Say hi to Paloma.
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Will you need to change the name of your blog again, or are you going to Canada?
What a beautiful ending to this time in Mexico. And wonderful that you spent enough time in one place to begin to have the community experience that is so key to Mexican and Latin American culture.