Twelve varieties of shellfish exist in the Concho River, concha meaning "shell", one of them producing the famous Concho pearls with colors ranging from purple to yellow.
I hope to connect with my body differently than tango...through the human emotional angst of country music, raw and revelatory at the same time, the history of regional dance, and how we all find our way to "remembering" that we all belong everywhere we go. Here in Texas, I want to revive what lives in me as I resonate with the country voices, with the pedal steel guitar's slide, and the fiddle's bucking bow. I want to feel the lingering vibe within old dance halls along a Texas dance trail, sense the ghosts of those who have two-stepped around the halls in joy and laughter as a balance to hard, or easy, lives as they eeked out sustainability in the hills and valleys and plains spreading out from the Rio Grande.
I start here in San Angelo, where Texas history is strong. Where Fort Concho brought soldiers... needing distraction from their dangerous lives, the tender touch of a woman, and the bounce of wooden floor boards beneath their muddy boots.
Miss Hattie's
Enough was enough after four years of a bad marriage. After a scandalous divorce in 1902, Mrs. H.A. Hatton, known as "Miss Hattie", did what any woman needing to survive did—open a business. She retained the upper floor of the building she and her husband built in San Angelo, and use it she did. He left town quickly. |
All names associated with the museum’s history are protected. Some of the “girls” were deeded ranch properties from favorite “customers”, and according to our tour guide, “No one wants to admit that grandma worked in the bordello once upon a time.”
The girls were well taken care of, well paid (making as much in one month as men would make in six months.), kept healthy. But no alcohol was allowed to the girls. Miss Hattie made sure of that.
“Feel free to sit on the couch,” our guide tells the group of all women. "Go back in time and see what it would have felt like.”
I can almost hear each wooden floor board creak in protest that no one is dancing on it. The squeal of the slide guitar lubricates the atmosphere, but only three couples have found residence at the tables in this dance hall saloon. One couple across the room gets up to shuffle around the floor, and all I can do is sip on my soda water and lemon and listen to the band, Swing Machine.
I’ve picked a tall round table near a corner of the dance floor, hopefully to be seen by anyone coming in behind me. An hour into the band performing, l start to let go of my dreams of honkytonk two- stepping tonight with long legged Texans, preferably adorned by cowboy hats, and wearing very cool boots.
In a movie video I owned years ago, one of the characters had been from San Angelo. This is all I needed as a reason to drive through this town, and then several dance hall options had shown up on my Google search.
At first, I think a glint of light is bouncing off of the silver toe tips on my boots. But then I see the shine of a silver ring on his outstretched hand, and I turn to look up at him. His eyes are shadowed by the brim of his black hat, and brownish gray hair wisps out from beneath his hat along his neck. He smooths down his goatee surrounding his smile.
My hand takes his and he helps me down from the stool, helps me up the step onto the dance floor. Scanning down his long blue-jeaned legs, I stare at his boot tips, then up past his belt buckle to his eyes. With his arm around my back, he adjusts his left hand to hold my right one in a better position, and we have the floor mostly to ourselves.
With only a few of the older couples dancing at all, he pretty much becomes my sole partner for the rest of the evening. He’s about the only single man dancing tonight, so once the band takes a break, I boldly invite myself to join him at his table, my shells dropping onto the floor—well, with the guise that I want to ask him about other dance events coming up over the next few days. Mostly, I feel conspicuous sitting alone.
By the end of the evening, from within his thick Texas drawl, he eventually invites me to use his spare bedroom just out of town rather than sleep in my truck at the Walmart parking lot. I have no doubt he is a gentleman, and his offer is honorable, so I follow his truck past Lake Nasworthy, past the regional airport, down lanes and ranch roads, through water filled dips in the road, to his house.
Two dogs greet us as we pull in, and once inside, I peruse the the photos of him, as a younger man, in his rodeo days of bull riding. He’s already shown me photos on his phone of his ruby Harley motorcycle, and given me a quick tutorial on how to tell if a Harley rider is in a gang or not. He is not.
Retired now, he works on welding and art projects, and tells me which wooden frames he's made for the rodeo photos on the wall, and how he made the metal spare bed frame.
"Take my cell number," he says on my way out. "Just in case you need anything more while in town."
Connection is a beautiful thing. No shells needed.
After a day of checking out San Angelo, I find myself at Fifi’s for the evening. I pull out a stool at a counter facing the dance area, adjacent to Fifi’s lit up Airstream trailer set up inside next to the bandstand, and head over to the bar to get my usual soda water and lemon.
The vocals twang out the usual “country music” angst of drinking and heartbreak, sometimes with a twist of swing. A whole group of young military persons from Goodfellow Air Force Base takes up a row of tables, gets out on the floor after the dance lesson, and energizes the evening. My boots click away on the stool rung. At least I can dance in place.
“Wednesday is a better day to dance here for our age group,” an older man sitting at a table next to me says into my left ear. I nod, but don’t regret dancing the evening with my rodeo cowboy last night.
I explain my travel story to the man and his wife, and later on, he gets me up on the floor, for which I am grateful. It’s all I need for others to see I can actually dance. I eventually two-step with the dance instructor, then bite my lower lip as he teaches me a couple of line dances, and some kind of cowboy polka or something. Give me a bouncy two-step or a flowing waltz anytime.
Once the military faction heads out, the floor opens up for the last few dances of the night, a couple of other men ask me to dance, and I get the run down on Saturday’s dance agenda from one of them.
As the VFW parking lot fills up with vehicles, I put in my contact lenses and check my hair in my rear view mirror. Coolers and bags are carried by others entering the hall, so I grab my water bottle in case there isn’t a bar where I can buy soda water to drink.
The Old Hat Band, an eclectic group of old hippies with long gray hair, with a younger fiddle player looking like he just got off his tractor, is already playing a slow two-step country tune. I had been forewarned of the strange L-shaped dance floor layout, and pick a table diagonally across from the band, at the inside corner of the “L”. And as often happens when I pop into these events, I can feel everyone’s stares on the back of my neck.
“Are you with the band?” An perky 60's-ish woman asks as she walks by.
“No.”
“Me neither,” she says, takes a seat at the far end of my table, and plops down her drink. Definitely an older coupled crowd, I’m happy for any seemingly single person to be nearby.
One of the men I danced with last night sits down across from the woman at our table and introduces us. Relieved to know someone, to have some connection, makes it easier to be here. Some days I feel outgoing, others more shy. I just need some kind of opening.
“Seems to be an older crowd wherever I go,” I say to the woman. “Are the younger folks not two- stepping these days?”
“Not much. They’re too busy with their phones, like everywhere, I guess. Some of the halls offer other music and they tend to go to those places. It’s too bad.”
I look around the hall to see if anyone looks under 60—maybe a few, but not many. But the sweetness in the room is lovely to watch, couples in their 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s, shuffling around the “L” in each other's arms. Couples who have danced decades with each other.
“Hello there,” another woman says to me as she walks around the "L". “I don’t know you. I’m the assistant manager here at the VFW.”
I tell her I’m traveling through, hoping to dance while in San Angelo.
“Then I’ll send you over a partner,” she says and hurries off before I can thank her.
Once dancing, introductions get made to locals.
“Traveling by yourself, honey?” one woman asks. Supposedly she was once the chief of police.
“Well, we are so happy you are here,” says another. "Come back again sometime."
I slowly shuffle some version of a two-step with any man who will ask me. It's just great to be moving around the floor, even if I'm not breaking a sweat.
From around the corner, a hand extends out in invitation, and I'm glad to see the long legs, boots, and hat. Instead of shuffling, he smoothly floats me around the “L”, every now and then opening up his embrace to turn me.
“I watched you with a couple of other men," he says while we dance, "and thought, ‘Hell, she can actually dance.’ “ Indeed I can. Indeed he and I do.
As the clock inches it’s way towards 9 p.m., I start to get ready to move on over to The Concho Palace for the later dance. I had been told that a group of folks, including my hatted, long legged partner, would be dancing at both venues tonight, and I’m on board with that. Besides, I know my rodeo guy will be there, too. I’ll definitely get some energetic moves in.
Once at the Palace, I sit with my new VFW friends, and toast to long-legged, two-stepping Texans. Plus, another spare bedroom offer comes in for my last night in town. Can't beat that kind of connection...."shell" free.