The Prairie: 1964

Philadelphia

"Papa, won't you dance with me, please dance with me, oh dance with me..." was the refrain I sang in my best mezzo. It was 1964, and I was Mama, one of the leads in Jules Styne's High Button Shoes. It originally debuted on Broadway in 1947, ( I was one year old that year just for the record ) and won a Tony award for its brilliant choreography created by the legendary Jerome Robbins. The story line is ala Music Man: con man comes into New Brunswick, dazzles the pretty girl, inflames the townfolk. The music is catchy, a little vaudevillian--and perfect for a high school cast--which we most definitely were.

I can still remember the dresses. And, yes, the absolutely real high button shoes that our director, a huge man who didn't so much walk as sway like a human version of a plastic punching bag clown, weighed down with sand. My husband, Papa, was played by John McClain. At the end of the catchy Papa tune, in which he stubbornly refuses to dance, I spin around, back to him, put my arms out as if they were wings to help me fly--and lean back for him to catch me--lifting my ankle length black velvet dress and kicking up the heels of my shiny high button shoes. Every night during rehearsal I prayed that John would make the catch. You see, John was about 5'2" tall and maybe 150# wringing wet. Me, at that time? Well, let's say 5'5", and ...probably 150# wringing wet.  He never missed me, but sometimes, I thought I heard a quiet "Ugh" as I landed on his chest, his arms under my armpits.

And why all this memoir now?

It is ( can this be so? ) going to be the 45th anniversary of my high school graduation in a little over a month. And Mary Seifert, who has been the glue that keeps the remnants of our class of 200 communicating, if ever so slightly, emailed me. " If you have some stories from high school that you would like in the book we are producing, send them along to me." And for some reason, out of all the possible stories--other plays like Curious Savage ( my debut Freshman year ), Oklahoma, Arsenic and Old Lace ( yup, I was Abby, the arsenic-in-elderberry-wine  sister) , a silly pre-Title 9 basketball team that I organized with ( of course ) no coach like the boys; piano recitals, creating the design and helping lead the effort for all the decorations for Junior prom ( It was a modern take on Roman columns)--I had one hoisted into my upstairs bedroom after prom and it stayed there, its white corrugated paper wrapped in hand turned rosebuds, until my mother moved almost 20 years later (; running for student council president, then treasurer; big choral gigs with other schools doing pieces like a gorgeous arrangement of "Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor " ( I can still sing the alto line ). 

I wrote Mary back and recounted the story of me falling into John's arms for the reunion book. And for just a moment, I smiled at those innocent, yet complicated days of adolescence when everything seemed to me to be important, dramatic, meaningful. When I spent after school hours strolling home with my classmate, Jenny Boller. Often we would end up at my house, find a heavily carb-loaded snack and then I would go to the piano. We would sing from the musical scores of South Pacific, or This Land is Your Land by Pete Seeger or old spirituals. It didn't matter. We had nowhere to go, nowhere to be but right there. Two girls in Waterloo, Iowa, trying to find out who we were going to be when we grew up.

I don't know about Jenny, but I am still deciding.

M.C.