Not everybody wears pants. Some in fancy dress
show their shins. Asking for a dance is easy
as a bare-knuckle shoulder tap but if you offer
a touch more, you might just rile the backbone
of a would-be partner’s partner, ready to hand
you a straight-arm shove through a horse stall.
Cowboys can be fishermen. The fishiest pool in a
corner nearest the door like land grabbers waiting
for a starter-gun blast or a swig of whiskey from a
flask etched with thirsty initials. The best hoofers
swill beer. But when a tipsy liquor spill leads to a
thunderclap on the jaw, drawing spittle and blood,
the stout man with a megaphone and wrinkled
mud on his boots shouts: Bleeding’s normal, folks.
Bleeding’s normal.
For Sara Parrott, square dancing in gym class was an annual treat. She stumbled through quick calls to allemande left and dive for the oysters. The rough and tumble undercurrent of who got to dance with whom sparked her heels. It lives on in Waltzing Through the Ramshackle Barn Dance.