"Footloose" was a Documentary, Y'all

                Just like Kevin Bacon’s character in Footloose, I have been dealt harsh punishments from good Christians related to dancing in a place thought to be inappropriate.  It was a cook-out at a lake.  Allow me to explain.

                My aunt and uncle had a ranch just outside the bustling metropolis of Bogata, TX, population (allegedly) 1,100.  I’m unsure who or what was deemed as ‘population’, but based on my time living there, this included dogs, blackbirds and, when necessary to get up the numbers back up due to someone’s death, tractor tires. 

The specific location of the ranch was Rosalie, an even tinier community as far away from the Bogata Baptist Church as it takes for someone (usually me) to sing the country super-group Alabama’s hit “Love in the First Degree”, if you held the last note for a good 30 beats or so.  This must be done from either the open bed of a pickup (Ford or Chevy depending on your inclinations) or the open truck of a Lincoln Town Car, depending on who was driving.  Those who are surprised must not be familiar with my background as the lead singer of The Pine Branch Boys, when I was in the 8^th Grade.  I have carried the baggage of celebrity for a long time, y’all.

As there isn’t much to do in Bogata, much less Rosalie, there were often activities planned for the youth at church that included inventing new reasons to eat outside at night.  I don’t know if this particular cookout was to celebrate the fact that it gets dark at night or that it was summer or something equally mundane, but cookout we did, on the banks of Lake Providence West. The original Lake Providence was in Northeast Louisiana, where my parents grew up and met and I and my sister were born, after an appropriate lapse in time, thank you.  This body of water was much, much smaller but we were homesick, I suppose.

Once we started the fire, ate our hot dogs and s’mores (in which the chocolate never melted from the heat of the marshmallows, regardless of how hard those commercials try to convince you is possible), most of the adults retired to my aunt and uncle’s home, about a mile away, on the other side of the Irby Dairy Farm, possibly to escape the noise and Christian antics of a baker’s dozen Baptist youth.  I never saw an aerial view or drawing of my relative’s ranch but, based on the fact that we had to drive through the dairy farm to go from one side of the ranch to the other, the Irby’s land was the hole in the center of the donut of my extended family’s acreage.

Someone had brought their jambox that also had a radio (remember those?) and we found a station playing what we had been told was the devil’s music.  You may remember them as The Go-Gos. 

As heathens are wont to do, some of us started dancing, only two of us with any rhythm.  Baptists are not known for being rhythmic in any capacity and rarely use the word as it sounds ‘dirty’.  It was innocent fun and ended rather quickly due to God being omnipresent and, therefore, lurking somewhere nearby we assumed, but I had seen a new dance move by one of my cousins that intrigued me.  I saved her from recrimination then and I am steadfastly loyal even now.  As all innocents do, right before their undoing, I asked for and received a quick lesson and mastered the rudiments if not the dance itself. 

The next morning, after breakfast back at the house, the adults were in the living room chatting.  The teens and really tall 12-year-olds were in the kitchen performing some sort of child labor and singing, I assume, Hard Knock Life (from Annie) as you do when you are feeling overworked and underappreciated, when something came over me.  I don’t know if it was the devil himself or too much socializing with The Methodists, but I took my new dance step out for a test drive.  Any sin committed in the dark is quickly exposed in the light and I was caught red-handed or rather red-footed by one of my aunts.  When she asked, heatedly, what I was doing, I said, “Dancing” as ashamed as an Amish teenager on Rumspringa, y’all.

I was summoned before the tribunal, otherwise known as my mother, grandmother, other aunt and uncle.  They demanded I give a full account of the activities including, if possible, at which point we had headed down the path of unrighteousness, a demonstration of the sinful movements and a list of fellow sinners and/or witnesses.  My crazy aunt tried not to laugh; the other members were as serious as a spelling bee, people.  I felt like someone on trial, which I most assuredly was.    

Have you ever had to complete a brand-new dance move with no accompanying music, while crying, on a Saturday morning in the living room of a single-wide trailer in Northeast Texas?  No?  Trust me when I tell you this is humiliation on an epic scale, especially when there is the very Biblical wailing and gnashing of teeth inside your head.  Silent, internal flagellation will throw off your rhythm something fierce, y’all, especially when you are trying to modify the dance move into whatever is least likely to get you cast into the Lake of Fire. 

Apparently, I felt stomping my foot really hard in one spot, like I was either ‘pitching a fit’ or squishing a bug, was the least offensive move I could make.  The tribunal scoffed and peppered me with more questions, demanding to know if that was really all that happened and instructing me to reveal my co-sinners.  Tearfully, and with a confidence I did not feel, I lied; like the heathen that I was.  I started wondering what it would be like in the Outer Darkness, where I was about to be cast.  I hoped there would be at least a night light as I was scared of the dark, y’all.  For real. 

Based on every After-School Special I had ever seen, starring unknown British kids with bad haircuts, I knew I had only tasted the sinful freedom of dance.  My punishment was the tried and true ‘whooping and solitary confinement’, which in a single-wide trailer was more akin to ‘don’t you dare look at anybody or have fun in any way’.  Even though I was unused to much punishment, being as close to Jesus as one can be wearing Husky-sized Tuffskins and hand-me-down cowboy boots, I was able to cope with the repercussions of my mistake.  But, in my heart-of-hearts, where all my secrets were kept, I knew I had to keep dancing; not so much for the love of movement, but for the opportunity to excel.  If dancing was to be my ultimate downfall (as was verbalized by someone in the tribunal – I was too teary-eyed to make out who), I wanted it to be for something a bit more decadent and/or impressive than the Electric Slide.

Can I get an Amen up in here?

"Stool-Kicker" is the new "Awesome"

               Yesterday I was honored to welcome the participants of the Leadership Development Institute to the Long Beach VA.  This is a program designed to create the next generation of leaders from VA facilities in California and Nevada.  When I get these opportunities I always strive to inspire others to get excited about learning and growing.  And you know I took more than my allotted minutes.
                Whenever I have the opportunity to speak to an audience of one or many, I want to challenge them to be bold, creative and passionate.  I tell them to look around and see what’s missing and then fill that slot; whatever it may be.  Be the change you want to see.  Be the passion you can’t find.  Be the creativity that you think is sorely lacking.  And never be afraid to display your talents.  Own your awesomeness, I always say.  And The Dad would agree.  His most famous saying, not related to flatulence or food, is, “It ain’t braggin’ if it’s a fact.”
                I have some musical talent.  I sing, play the trumpet and can dance like no Baptist ever should, y’all.  And it’s a family thing; music, not dancing, although in the spirit of full disclosure, my mother did teach me how to do The Stroll, The Twist and The Mashed Potato to the tunes of the American Graffiti soundtrack.    I guess we were Methodists on Saturdays?
               I have always loved music; singing, dancing, listening, you name it.  My tastes run the gamut from Christian and country to folk and dance music, both hits of the 80s and club music from the 90s. I also love four-part harmony.  Prior to 6^th grade I thought the only music that existed was the Beach Boys and the Statler Brothers.  My mother stated it was her car; her music.  I love to sing tenor in a mixed quartet or alto when it’s an all-male quartet.  The point is I love me some music, y’all.  Can I get an Amen?  
                Whenever I think of music I can’t help but remember Ms. Neva Jean Oates, music teacher extraordinaire at Bogata Junior High.  You want to talk about passion?  How about a woman who would pound out the melody to any song you could name, while yelling chord changes to the beginner guitarists and keyboardists, who were sharing the stage with vocalists, both lead and back-up?  I can picture her now, just going to town playing and yelling, “C! B flat! G!” and the musicians would strum or finger the note until the next one was yelled.  It was fun and riotously entertaining.
                I have mentioned Bogata, TX many times and I mention it again as this was a tiny, tiny, tiny town chock full of talent; not to mention our tiny, tiny, tiny sister city, Talco.  There were so many student bands at our schools that the year-end Variety Show was a musical extravaganza. 
               As a member of the briefly existing Pine Branch Boys, I feel my musical roots are here.  If memory serves our group was formed for the sole purpose of a barnstorming tour of not just Bogata Elementary/Jr. High but also Deport.  That’s right, y’all.   I was on tour for exactly one day.  Try not to be jealous.  My rendition of Alabama’s “Roll On” brought cheers and applause unheard of until, at the very least, the Rodeo.
                There were other bands that were more legitimate, meaning they had a name and t-shirts and sometimes even backdrops.  My memory is sometimes cloudy, from the Aqua Net haze of the 80s, but I remember an all-girl group called Midnight Lace, a country/pop band named Stardust, a hard rock group with the interesting moniker Plexus and a country/crossover group called The Derricks; there are others I’m sure I am forgetting.  And I won’t bother to try and recite all the members, but I’ll throw out a few names like Allen Dale Huddleston, Marty Burns, Kendra Moore, Ray Lou Damron, Matt Case, Jody Thornton, Donita Lewis.
                I remember one unforgettable performance at the Variety Show in 1980-something.  The Rebel Flag Corps had finished their routine to “Addicted to Love” for which the previously mentioned Wood Sisters and I were costume designers and assistant choreographers.  The performers were resplendent in white shorts and white ripped sweatshirts as an homage to Jennifer Beals, with matching neon tank tops and socks.   My bangs are starting to feather just thinking about it.
              Tricia Duffer was normally the lead singer for The Derricks, but for this particular song, Tim J. Wood, pianist and the Wood Sister’s brother, was in the spotlight.  It was a cover of Yes’ “Owner of a Lonely Heart” and Mr. Wood displayed about eleventy-seven kinds of passion when during his piano solo, he stood, kicked back his stool and finished that song standing up, y’all.  I remember thinking, “I have never been so passionate that I kicked a stool on stage in front of people.  I need to get more out of life.”
                Now I’m not saying that was a turning point in my life, but I will say that for some reason I still remember it, so draw your own conclusions.  They always say to dance like no one is watching and I agree. But don’t forget someone is always watching, so make it good, y’all.  Show out a little bit.  You never know what could happen.
                And that’s all I’m saying for now.