Pervy Lounge

There's a hot spot in South Beach that combines the intimate feel of a jazz lounge with the energy of a dance club. And by intimate, I mean that last night my shirt absorbed the sweat of many strangers as my breasts inadvertently collided with various and sundry sleeveless, strapless and horny humans of both the male and female persuasions, with perhaps a few in between or undecided. And by energy, I mean that we can stop having a war in Iraq over oil, because if you could just bottle and harness the release of the pent-up sexual energy that nearly blew the roof off the building, the so-called energy crisis would be no more.

Yes, I went clubbing last night for approximately 2 hours for the first time in a few years. Better yet: I got carded at 39 years young!

Now, when I was a wee chick, I used to get my dance on at institutions like the Hameo and The Bitchin' Club. Dance floors were for dancing and when you wanted to swap spit or grope your lover you practiced discretion and moved off the dance floor. And surely, if you wanted to have sex, you went to the parking lot or the beach.

Ah, memories. The sand is long gone from my ass, the Bitchin' Club is defunct and even though the Hameo's marquee still shines, it's not the fun, carefree club I knew and loved. But that's another story.

Back to Pervy Lounge, where no one was actually dancing. Good lord, what has happened to the art form in the last twenty years? Was I in a clubbing coma when "get down tonight" became an orgy of dry humping?

I'm no prude, but boy did I start contemplating the limits of candor! To wit:

• One couple was making out so heavily I wanted to walk over and pull his pants down and throw them on the couch. Forget getting a room! Relieve your erection now! You'll have blueballs by the time the cab drops you off at the hotel. And as for her, what of the embarrasing arousal stains on your satin cargo pants?

• One girl was dry humping everyone on the couch. She tried this random gesture of estrus with me and unfortunately I had no $1 bills. Besides, between putting boobs in someone's face and having boobs put on, I prefer the former.

• Oh and another couple, let's call them Fred and Ginger, had only a layer of denim to prevent them from a glorious session of bum fucking. He flat against the wall and she rubbing her generous rump against his groin in a frenzied dance of anal interruptus.

• And one mas was sitting on the couch next to me while I was too involved in my own gyrating dervish to notice that he had in fact positioned himself quite strategically so that his face would be near my own largess, if you know what I mean. So when I walked away, he stood up, placed his hands on my shoulder and looked lustily into my eyes. Note to self: improve ass-gawker radar skills.

• And yet another couple was bumping and grinding like they were the hottest shit in the house, but they never once looked into each other eye's. Quite sad, actually.

And so the following conversation screaming match ensued with my wonderful friend, Nectarina.

Manola: Jesus Christ what the fuck is all this bump and grind and squat and hump shit?
Nectarina: It's just a prelude to sex.
Manola: Oh come on, what's the point of having sex later if you're already having sex NOW?
Nectarina: It's foreplay.
Manola: Bumping uglies with a stranger you might not even get laid with is foreplay?
Nectarina: It's all good, babe.
Manola: Aw yeah, but girlfriend, I feel like I'm air-fucking here 'cause I don't have a partner!

Nectarina cracked up, lit up a smoke and we sat down for a spell, while I sipped my vodka tonic and pondered many philosophical issues. If folks are dancing at a groovy South Beach lounge to make a swinger's club look like granny's knitting club and a stripper's pole dance look like formal cotillion, we must ask: are you so hog-tied repressed in your life that you have to unleash a mighty libido in public? And if you're having an outrageously wonderful sex life behind closed doors, don't you want to take a break when you go clubbing? And if you go home and give your boyfriend shit about watching porn, aren't you a hypocrite for participating in the voyeuristic pleasures of this club?

Ah, screw it. Dance has always been about sex. I learned the hard way by pounding my already busted dancer's bunions practicing tango for several years. Tango is an art form in which you explore relationship as an act of receiving and giving. Tango challenges you to see love as an exchange of energy and to seek a pure, seamless communication between yourself and your partner. It's a beautiful metaphor for life and loving.

There's a world of difference between the subtle exchange of sexual energy in a tango and the raw, animalistic display of the dance I witnessed. It's sexual, to be sure, but far from erotic. Want sexy? Leave something to the imagination and some room for the heart.

Don't get me wrong. It really is all good. Whatever makes kids happy: fine by me. It's certainly quite an entertaining spectacle and heck, they even played some of the same tunes that I rocked to at my twenty-year high school reunion!

I freely admit I had a blast air-fucking my imaginary man in pointy-toed animal print stilletos while shaking my ass and keeping an open mind. But damn, I just have to wonder, has this generation hit rock bottom? There is no place to go from here but the mattress.

tags: south beach, clubbing, sex, dance , tango