Dance with Me in Packrat

Dance with me, I want to be your partner
Can’t you see? The music is just starting
Night is falling, and I am calling
Dance with me

Fantasy could never be so thrilling
I feel free, I hope that you are willing
Pick the beat up, and kick your feet up
Dance with me

Let it lift you off the ground
Starry eyes, and love is all around us
I can take you where you want to go

Dance with me, I want to be your partner
Can’t you see? the music is just starting
Night is falling, and I am calling
Dance with me

Let it lift you off the ground
Starry eyes, and love is all around us
I can take you where you want to go

Dance with me, I want to be your partner
Can’t you see? the music is just starting
Night is falling, and I am calling
Dance with me

Writer(s): Hall John Joseph, D. Hall Johanna

The song plays in my head often lately. The lyrics say what I am not brave enough to say myself, what I sing in my fantasies to someone with whom the dance could have been a reality.

The song has been quieted for years, but this year it reawakened, stirred from dormancy by the dance…too long away for observances of tribal traditions, from the heartbreak of losing my Little Brother and the Coyote, respecting other members of the family who left this world, my love of the dance returned.

But there’s one dance for which I’ve only ever been an observer. The Indian two step. The singers drum and sing while couples join hands and hurry to join in. Women ask the men, and they can’t refuse; if they do, they have to pay what the MC says they should. Usually not more than a few dollars.

Daughters dance with daddies. Someone always asks the MC. Some couples are married or sweethearts; some are thinking about it. Some are children dancing with other children because they love to dance.

One night under a summer night sky…we danced; he was the head man dancer for that pow wow, and I sat behind his bench, my camp his base for the weekend. I was a grown woman but a young one, in a schoolgirl flush that not only did he know I was alive but that he was there with me. The night was perfect, and I basked in my joy when the MC announced the two step and told him to get his partner. The head man and head lady dancers typically dance together, so I was totally unprepared when he smiled and asked, “Are you ready?”

I choked and stammered, “I can’t!” Because I’m stupid like that.

I had my reasons; I felt I couldn’t lead a dance I’d never done. I gave him a gift for my refusal and explained why I said no. Cousin M wanted to kill me right then and there. My own mother said I humiliated him. Other family members never let me live it down, still to this day. Even Little Brother, who didn’t like pow wows, had comments about it, and he didn’t even like the head man dancer.

To defend myself I always bark back, “It’s just a dance!” Now I hide in the restrooms or under the bleachers so no one will ask me again, especially when I’m supposed to do the asking.

Another summer night years later he was the MC for a pow wow. When the two step started my aunts urged me to ask him, but I didn’t; when we danced during another song he saw me and danced in place until I reached him, and he danced at my side until the song was over. My aunts commented, “You got to dance with him anyway.”

Our paths have crossed several times since then. We are still friends, emailing occasionally, and he visited me last year. In catching up at work, clearing my desk of all the filing I started before I got sick and all the mail that has accumulated since then, I found his card; I know he is still in that position, and the numbers tempt me every time I see the card.

He had a rough road a few years ago but seems himself again; I’m now older and more comfortable being me. I don’t anticipate a great romance if I reach out to him, but in my mind we’re under a starry summer sky, and I say, “Dance with me…“

Last updated August 07, 2017