Taxi Dancers

I was in downtown LA to work at the Orpheum, Theatre on Broadway. I parked at Broadway and Olympic. I walked toward the theatre past an open door. It was  a dance hall. Inside I saw something I thought was gone decades ago. A taxi dance venue. I thought places like that disappeared in the 1950s. I slowed down and looked at the scene inside.

I saw what in some ways reminded me of a dance in 6th grade. The women were on one side of the room dressed in their nice tight dresses, hair and makeup done, clutching small purses. The men were mainly Latinos, dressed in cowboy boots, jeans, and some had cowboy hats, around pool tables playing pool and standing in groups.

No one was dancing.

A DJ played music in a booth and the men looked like they were having a good time. The women were patient. Waiting for a man to get the courage to cross that huge divide that separates groups of men from groups of women.

I remember seeing taxi dancers in a movie or some TV show. I thought it was sad and lonely. To see it in reality... It was sad in reality too.

Where do these men and women come from? Taxi dancing seems so odd. It might get you as meany dances as you pay for but it's rather hollow companionship. What an odd archaic thing to still exist in a world of online dating.