House Representative T.S. McMillan of Charleston looking on as flappers dance The Charleston, with the Capitol building in background.
I worked a 13-and-a-half-hour day last week. At the end of it, I was with some very tired cohorts, and the radio was still jamming in the establishment. We all looked lifeless, spent. Then, the first chords of AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" belted out. As tired as everyone was, heads started bobbing, bootys swayed, and tabletops turned into drums. I have a few years on these kiddos so I was the one chair-thumping. I can Pop Drop and Lock with the best of them, but my version is the literal description of what would happen if I tried to perform it.
Music: the miracle cure, salve on weary souls, grown-up lullabies. Dance: the expression of my insides. Years ago, I realized that you can no more dance and be unhappy at the same moment than you can blow Hubba Bubba bubbles while frowning. And here in Charleston, it should come as natural as swatting mosquitoes. The South has, after all, churned out a few classics. Remember that The Charleston (developed by Kathryn Wilson) became a popular dance craze in the wider international community during the 1920s. Despite its origins, the dance is most frequently associated with flappers and speakeasies. Speakeasies were back-alley bars that ran during the American Prohibition. Here, these young women would dance alone or together as a way of mocking the "drys," or citizens who supported the Prohibition amendment (as The Charleston was then considered quite immoral and provocative).
Jump up 20 years and flocks of kids were converging on the beach boardwalks of the Carolinas to do the Shag dance. The Shag was designated the official state dance by Act Number 329 of 1984.
Though dancing was one of the first indicators that I was getting better after surgery—I shagged by myself to Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl" with the fridge door—my feet weren't always happy feet. There was a time when the music died. After swaying and waxing philosophic on friends' couches during the 70s to 8-tracks of the Eagles and Pink Floyd, and dancing my butt off in the 80s and early 90s, the club nights and house parties became fewer and farther between. Slowly, the inside music died and Stella lost her groove. I tried to dance a few times around the house during my decade-long dry spell. It was the most pathetic non-rythmic display my mirror had ever witnessed.
Then one day, I was in a retail store browsing through the racks. A song came on the piped music; it was "Under the Boardwalk" by the Drifters. My shoulders started first, and the short waves traversed down to the dead dancing nerves in my feet. Soon my happy feet were shuffling unseen beneath the clothes racks. I was shagging. When I got home, I threw my packages down and Youtubed some beach music. I was cutting the rug to some old shag tunes and it felt sooooo good. Over the next couple of months, Stella got her goove back.
Now, it might not be pretty. But, if the music's in me, it's going to come out.
At a recent visit to my daughter's, I had a room crying-laughing as Grandma held her own with Grandaughter to "Hey Ya" by Outcast on the Wii Dance. And I smile thinking of one Carolina summer eve on the back porch. My sister got up and started dancing by herself to the music on the iPod, minutes later another friend joined her, her husband looking inquisitively on from inside and shaking his head.
The message? It's much more fun if you dance like no one is watching and praying that they weren't. I may have startled a landscaper or two while throwing down near my patio window a few times. But, it's okay. Drive it like you stole it, baby!
(Photo Credit: Library of Congress LC-US762-93721)
