With thanksgiving around the corner, I’d like to give a little thanks. Words can’t describe how fortunate we all are to call a place like Durango home. But there is room for improvement. We are missing a crucial piece that any well-established town has: a quality dance floor.
While chatting with Flow, an exchange student from Germany, I asked what he thought of Durango, and, in particular, what it is missing. The first thing that came to Flow’s mind was a “club.” Other students who come from around the country (and around the world) also agree that there is a lack of a quality groovy room.
All over campus I hear whispers of the need to dance. For one, concerts and smaller clubs provide camaraderie between people. Everyone assembles for one reason, to have a good time. Dance unifies strangers. It bridges the gap between the heart and the head in one outward expression that ultimately says, “I love my life, I love tonight and I love you.” These things are communicated by one’s movement to the music. If you dance your night away instead of sitting around a bar, I guarantee you’ll walk home buzzing and wake up with a sense of accomplishment instead of a pounding head and empty wallet.
There is only one place where people dismiss the combination of sweat and claustrophobia. And that is the dance floor. Music is magical. It convinces your body to do things it otherwise would not. The beat creates an entourage of emotion, while the lyrics spread a single idea through the crowd’s mind. The result is a room full of people, all in agreement.
In the summer there are a handful of family-oriented festivities that provide music and a place for the town to get funky. But with the change of seasons, people need a new place to socialize. There is one venue, Animas City Theatre, that offers the opportunity to enjoy a dance floor. But the ACT hosts a very limited number of shows each month, genres of acts jumping from The Infamous String Dusters one week, to Dirt Nasty the next. Its space is very limited and can only support a small crowd.
As a town, we are grateful for the attempt at providing the one thing missing from our community – but we can do better (though, not even Farmington offers a good place to dance). Don’t even get me started on the Wild Horse. They pack it in, but the fact that it is a cowboy bar leads me to believe that it appeals more to Bayfield’s fighting and farming demographic than Durango’s fun-loving, adventurous types.
The creation of a club would do more than just make money, but allow the police department to – I don’t know – stop wasting their time busting college house parties.
Ryan Yaseen is a Durango boy by birth, currently a sophomore studying communication at FLC. Outside school, his preoccupation’s involve world travel, mountain biking and adventure sports.
