Dance
Dedicated to a special friend, Willy Harpster,
who loves dance as much as I do.
(Revised 5/2006 by Helen)
First three paragraphs adapted from “House by the Railroad Tracks 1929 - 1934"
Dedicated to a special friend, Willy Harpster,
who loves dance as much as I do.
(Revised 5/2006 by Helen)
First three paragraphs adapted from “House by the Railroad Tracks 1929 - 1934"
Note to family:
“Willy” is short for Wilhelmina. I’d always planned to do this piece on dance to go at the end after the rest of “Treks” was finished.
And I planned to give a copy to Willy because of our shared love for dance. But Willy is ill and prognosis is not good, so I detoured to “Dance”
so I could give it to her while there’s still time for her to enjoy it.
Growing up, I often entertained dancing fantasies where I imagined performing graceful, next to impossible maneuvers, floating so that I sometimes never touched the ground. One night after Mama put me to bed, through the drapes that separated the bedroom from the rest of the house, I could hear music from the phonograph in the living room.
Mama and Dad were dancing. The music got the best of me of me emotionally. I climbed out of bed and stuck my head between those drapes, tears streaming down my face. When they asked what was wrong, I sobbed, “I want to dance too.”
Well, they remedied that. They scooped me up and I wound up dancing right along with them. Happy memory.
I began violin lessons in sixth grade in Burke, Idaho. By the time I was in high school and we lived in Gem, I could play waltzes, la Varsouvienne, Turkey in the Straw, Irish Washer Woman, Sailor’s Hornpipe and other old time country and folk tunes. I’d play them and Mama and Dad would dance to them. Happy memories continued.
To my delight, every year the school in Poplar put on a dance review. Students were taught folk, tap, and other dance routines. I loved it! One day after practice, for some reason I was behind the piano on the stage when I heard two teachers discussing what they should do about one little girl who was so awkward and just couldn’t seem to get any of the dances right. They weren’t talking about me, but I was convinced they were. That sort of put a crimp in my dancing. I stiffened up because I was trying too hard to do everything right. That stayed with me through high school. At school dances, my partners would say, “Come on Helen, loosen up!” I’d keep trying to peek at their feet so I could make my feet follow. It’s a wonder I got even got asked to dance or invited to proms. But I did.
Some years later I worked in Portland and walked past the Arthur Murray dance studio every day on my way to and from work. One day I went in. An instructor asked me to dance, of course to sell me lessons. He turned out to be exactly the right person to get me on the right track. I don’t remember what he said but whatever it was, I immediately grasped from it the feeling of following. From then on, I could follow anyone. And in instead of selling me lessons, he asked if I’d like to be an instructor.
So I began instructor training. I loved teaching, but hated selling lessons and, of course, teachers who sold more were the ones who got the big paychecks.
Above, I claimed I could now follow anyone. There were exceptions. One included partners who couldn’t hear the beat if you beat them over the head with it. Another was one huge Hawaiian who asked me to dance, put his arm around my waist, and lifted me right off the floor. My feet barely brushed the floor once every few beats and made it next to impossible to follow him. I should have told him if he’d put me down he wouldn’t have to work so hard.
While at Arthur Murray, I got to learn wonderful ballroom dances: Fox Trot, Waltz, Swing, Tango, Samba, Rumba, Mambo. But I wasn’t tuned in to some of the current dance crazes like the Twist for instance. One day I ran into an acquaintance who, when he learned I was teaching at Arthur Murray, said he’d like to come in and learn the Twist. I told him I’d line him up with a good Twist teacher. He said, “No, I want you to teach me.” Well, I didn’t want to admit to him that I didn’t know how to Twist, so the day he was to come in, I checked out which teachers could do the Twist and cornered one of them for instruction every time he or she had a free moment. I twisted myself silly that day and my friend was happy with his lesson. But that ended my career with Arthur Murray. The next day my hip joints hurt so bad I could barely move. Doctor said “bursitis.” It did get better, to the point that months later I could again go out and enjoy dancing with friends, but recuperating took too long and I had to trade Arthur Murray for a job where I could sit down.
I once had the privilege of dancing with Arthur Murray himself. The Murray’s visited the Portland studio, and treated each teacher with a dance, gals with Arthur and guys with Katherine. I’d seen them dance on TV and he always looked so very stiff and dignified. But the minute he moved us on to the ballroom floor, I instantly felt, “This man is a dancer!” The dance was short but wonderful!
Twist aside, I taught my students to DANCE, not just perform step patterns which unfortunately some teachers emphasized more.
There was a Teachers’ Room where we’d go for breaks. The language in that room was not what you heard on the ballroom floor. Another teacher, a little Japanese girl, and I were targeted because we didn’t like swearing and dirty stories. When either of us entered the room, one male teacher in particular would start spieling filth out of his mouth. His brother was one of my students. He was a sweetheart and a real gentleman. On day I’d had my fill of the filth and said “Bill, when you do that, you think you’re embarrassing me. Well, you’re not. You just make me sick. Besides, I can’t figure out how a guy as sweet as your brother could have such a rotten brother.” I steeled myself for a filthy come back. Instead, Bill just stopped and looked at me, then said, “You know Helen, you’re right.” He cleaned up his act. The Teachers’ Room was much more pleasant from then on.
I was transferred to the Vancouver Studio to be the Dance Director, which meant that, in addition to customers, I also taught the teachers. Our Manager was Ib Johanssen, a large Danish man, who asked me out for dinner. At first I was attracted by his accent, but that attraction didn’t last long. We teachers began to suspect all was not well. It turned out, Ib didn’t handle his finances too well and had been evicted from his apartment. He moved into the Teacher’s Room which, in that studio was very small. He slept on the sofa. We found his dirty clothes behind the sofa. There was no shower in the studio. He replaced soap and water with deodorant to cover body odor. We couldn’t stand to go in the Teacher’s Room because it smelled so bad. And our smelly Manager actually danced with students! We should have just reported it to the Portland Manager but, instead, we left a note for him in the Teachers Room. Ib went in and stayed there for the longest time. Recuperating from what he read in the note, I’m sure.
He left not long after and was replaced by a new manager. That manager hadn’t been there long when he informed me he was coming to my place for dinner and he’d bring the groceries. I wasn’t too thrilled about that but, sure enough, he showed up at my door bearing groceries. So we had dinner and it wasn’t long before I became uncomfortably aware that he expected the Manager and the Dance Director to become a couple. I told him I liked him but wasn’t interested in him in that way. Strange thing. Soon after that, I received notice that I’d been transferred back to the Portland studio. That was before anybody even heard of litigious harassment cases. Too bad. I had grounds! He deserved to be taken to task.
One student at Vancouver was Mr. B., a hard working farmer and just a really nice person. Trouble was he always came to his lessons with dirt and grime from his farm work and machinery ground into his hands. When the lesson was over, much of that grime had been transferred to the back of my blouse. One day I walked into a restaurant and spotted Mr. B and his young son seated in one of the booths. I looked down at his hands a noticed how clean they were. I said, “Mr. B. your hands look so nice!” He said, “Yes, I worked butter today.” Next lesson he brought me a two-pound mound of fresh farm butter that he’d used to get his hands so clean. I thanked him and took it home to the house I shared with an older lady. I can still see us sitting one on each side of the table staring at that mound of butter and wondering what to do with it. One suggestion was to maybe boil it, then let it harden again. The final solution -- garbage can. Of course, I told Mr. B how much we enjoyed having his fresh butter, but I didn’t lay it on too heavy for fear he might bring more.
One male friend, Eddy, handsome and a really nice person, loved to dance. Trouble was, he’d almost break my back holding me in a position that forced me into a very uncomfortable backward bend. One day, when the Vancouver studio was closed and I knew it would be empty, I talked him into going there with me so we could dance in the ballroom. I had an ulterior motive. The ballroom walls were lined with mirrors and Eddy could see what he was doing. He said, “I don’t like those mirrors!” But, he quit breaking my back after that.
One evening at the University of Montana in Missoula, I was in the Student Union, sitting on a sofa visiting with some other students. A friend brought a fellow over, introduced him to me. He asked me to dance, all the while focusing on a spot over my head on the wall behind me. We danced. All went well at first. A mass of chairs had been pushed together hit and miss along one side of the room. My partner danced us right into the middle of the mess. He asked, “What’s the best way out of this?” We did get out and afterward someone asked, “I guess you didn’t know he was blind did you?” Oh me!
Sometimes friends and I would go to country and western dances at the Division Street Corral east of Portland. The band there had two top notch fiddlers who were also violinists with the Portland Symphony. One was a big stocky fellow, the other shorter and slight built. They not only fiddled like crazy, they were full of tricks, like bowing each other’s fiddles while fingering their own. The pay off was when we looked up at the stage to see the smaller of the two hanging upside down with his legs around the big fellow’s neck, swinging from side to side, while both kept right on fiddling those fiddles!
At the Corral, believe it or not, a one-legged man asked me to dance. He leaned against the stage front to keep his balance and did the most wonderful job of leading me in some good old Jitterbug. It was amazing and I really enjoyed the dance as much as if he’d two legs.
Brother, David, came to my apartment in Vancouver and asked if I’d teach him to dance. I was busy in the basement doing laundry, so that was our dance studio. I give him some basics to work on while I washed clothes, then when I could take a break, we’d go over the steps and fine points of movement and leading. His practice area was the floor beneath the clothes line which was secured on each end to a board hanging down from the floor supports above. Trouble is, at 6’5”, David’s head was higher than those clothesline end boards. He’d start at one end and move through the steps, deeply concentrating on what he was doing. When he reached the other end, it was “Ouch” as his head connected with an end board. He’d turn around and dance back to the other end and, “Ouch.” I don’t remember how many “Ouches” there were before I rescued him and guided him into a less painful practice pattern.
While at the Vancouver studio, about once a month one of the male instructors would come over from the Portland studio and together we’d give demonstrations at one of the clubs in town. Of course, the goal was to interest patrons in dance lessons, but also provided a little extra entertainment. We usually did some nice routines in different ballroom dances, but my favorite was when we demonstrated “Dancing Don’ts.” Most of the instructors were pretty nice looking, but that time Portland sent Mr. Pickell, accent on the last syllable. He was sort of a combination of Jimmy Durante and Ray Bolger and my own private joke was that the accented, first-syllable pronunciation fit him. But he could dance! We demonstrated such things as The Show-Off and The Flirt. In the first one my partner took us through all sorts of show-off maneuvers, ending by leading me into a dip. Instead of bending backward as you should in a dip, I hung there in sort of an “L” position. He raised his right arm with a flourish, then pretended to get carried away with his own exhibition and raised the other arm, dumping me on the floor. I got up in a huff and stomped off the floor. During The Flirt, I was the flirt, chewing gum and waving and calling out to guys in the audience as I danced with my Mr. Pickle. That cost me a favorite ring. On one wave I flipped my arm out and that ring slipped off. It flew across the room, landing at the feet of a spectator. He bent over, picked it up, and put it in his pocket. I thought, “No problem, I’ll ask him for it after the show.” He either thought it was part of the act or didn’t care, because man and ring disappeared.
I usually preferred going to dances with a group instead of a date because I’d get to dance with more partners. One night a group of us went to a ballroom in downtown Portland. As we entered I spotted this “kid” dancing up a storm on the other side of the room. I said to my friends, “I want to dance with that kid!” Well they were true friends and made sure the word got to the “kid” who turned out to be several years older than a kid. For sometime after that, Tommy was my dance partner. He wasn’t exactly a romantic interest but he made dancing a really wonderful experience. Turned out, he had danced in movies that called for background dancing. One night we went to a club where a man performed an amazing fete of gathering all the patrons’ first names before the show then, just a few minutes later, came out and recited an impromptu poem using all those names. With him were two girl dancers. After they performed, they called for a volunteer to join them. I snuck my hand behind and up over Tom’s head and pointed down at him. They took the bait, came down and escorted him to the stage. Tom didn’t mind a bit. They danced and Tom didn’t miss a trick. If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought they surely must have rehearsed together before the show. It was amazing. The girls did some pretty fantastic stuff, but Tom was right with them on every move.
A little departure from dancing here. Tom was a pilot and announced he was going to rent a small plane and fly us over Mt. Hood. I was a little uncomfortable about it because I don’t fly well. Sure enough, we’d only gone a little way when I announced that he needed to get me back on the ground -- NOW! He banked the little two-seater around to return, but not soon enough. He was a good sport. He taxied the plan to a faucet at the edge of the field and filled bucket after bucket with water which he threw on the “decorated” side of the plane and had it clean as a whistle when he turned it in.
He went back to California and we sort of lost track of each other. Some time later I received a letter from a Tom Buck from somewhere in the South Pacific. He’d found my address and wondered if I might be the same Helen Turner he knew in Portland, and had lost touch with. Would you believe that after that plane experience he actually hinted that we should get married? I was pretty sure this was my former dance partner, but I didn’t want to marry him and never got around to answering his letter. But I’ll always remember him as the best dance partner ever.
One night at that ballroom in Portland, Rolf asked me to dance. As soon as he opened his mouth I knew he was Scandinavian. Turned out he was an officer on a ship from the Far East but with a Norwegian crew. Rolf wasn’t much of dancer but other officers from the same ship were there and some of them were good dancers. I introduced them to my gal pals who came there with me and we ended up getting an invitation to dinner on their ship the next day. We went and that was fun. After that, whenever their ship tied up in Portland, Rolf would call and tell me to get my friends together for dinner aboard ship. On one of their visits, I thought it would be a treat to take them to the Jantzen Beach ballroom where I knew there’d be Scandinavian dancing. We entered the ballroom while the dancers were doing the polka. One of the Norwegians watched the dancers, and said to me, “Vat are dey doing? It’s so stiff. Come. Ve’ll show dem how to dance the polka.”
This tall skinny guy grabbed me and his long legs polkaed us around that floor like the wind. It was a challenge to keep up with him, but was that FUN! Most of the other dancers stopped to watch and you could tell they were enjoying it too.
I always sort of regretted that none of my family ever saw me dance. Mama and Dad visited the Portland studio once while I was still in training. They watched me and a partner dance swing and their reaction was well, that was nice but my skirt flared up too far. They were right, but I didn’t have my full gear yet. The female teachers, including me later, all wore flared skirts over ruffled net petticoats and all you saw when we spun around were piles of net ruffles.
Over the years I’ve attended some of my high school class reunions in Wallace, Idaho. A dance was always included in the events and I had no problem kicking up my heels. The last reunion was our fiftieth. At that time I hadn’t danced for a few years but felt confident I could still shake a leg. I spotted Scotty Patterson and observed that there was someone who knew how to waltz! Many people think a waltz is just a slow dance. Not true! Fast waltzes are wonderful! Slow or fast, they are simply three quarter time rather than four beats to the measure as with most other dances. I told Scotty and his wife that I’d surely like to borrow him for a waltz. So, the next time the band played a waltz, here came Scotty. Immediately I felt stiffness in my back. Arthritis, old age, and rust had affected my frame to the point I could no longer sway, bend, and float with the music and my partner. I heard those familiar words. Scotty said, “Come on. Helen, loosen up.” But my frame refused. I’d come full circle and my dancing days were over. I was crushed! Since then heart and equilibrium problems developed. Thanks to the latter, my best move on the dance floor today would be picking myself up off it.
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Well, Willy, we may no longer be able to dance the dance, but we can still enjoy our dancing memories.
*******
Willy has her own interesting stories of life in Holland during WWII. Her exuberant personality goes well with her deep Dutch accent. One day she came up to me and said breathlessly, “You won’t believe what happened!” She had attended a parade in downtown Olympia, heard tango music and saw a Latin band and tango dancers coming down the street. I can imagine Willy’s exuberant reaction, which is probably why one of the dancers pulled her out into the street to dance. Because of her health, she had to refuse. But you’d better believe, she wanted to dance that tango!