Jewish American Salsera (JAS) is an independent, financially successful woman who, in her own words, has "landed" in salsa world to her surprise and confusion at an age when she thought she might be doing other things (like driving children to soccer practice and obsessing about college tuitions). Since that is not the case, she frequently finds herself dancing, socializing and cavorting with men she otherwise might only communicate with as they take her plate or hand her the car keys. She's not a snob, just a product of American education and privilege. She's attractive, she's single, she's got nothing better going on than salsa world...which short of domestic bliss is pretty hard to beat.

The Animal (or maybe we should call him El Animal) is a salsero who looks like his namesake. In her words, he looks and dances "primordial." He's frequently drunk and sometimes a likes to throw his partners in the air (I can attest that it's terrifying). He loves JAS, she's his "favorite."

El Animal scared JAS at first, but now he's starting to grow on her. Thrown together by a mutual passion for music in a city where the two might only cross paths in the service industry, this odd couple seem to be developing a nice, weird, sort of platonic, salsa dance relationship.

If you live in Los Angeles the lines between classes are generally pretty cut in dry. Salsa World, however, is magical, to say the least...where else would these two come together? A playground that possesses the same sort of innocent openness of childhood, in this pretty hard society, Salsa World it's a pocket of love and acceptance that seems to widen the more time you spend in it.

Just for today, I love Salsa World