Men Without Feet

“Mickey! Get out of the bathroom,” Aunt Mary would yell until Cousin Mickey finally joined us at the kitchen table.

Sometimes Mickey had cramps, other times she was blocked, but her life centered in the bathroom. With only one false eyelash and her hair still untamed, it was clear that she would soon be heading back to finish putting on her face. Two hours later, she would still be in her slip and with a kimono-style robe over it.

Cousin Mickey (then 20-something) had been married in the Catholic Church. Her wedding reception was flashy and her groom flamboyant. Too bad dancing effortlessly with someone doesn’t mean that you glide into wedded bliss. The marriage evaporated almost as quickly as the champagne fizzled. Now back in her parent’s home and single again she worked as a secretary and went out dancing on the weekends.

While Dad and Aunt Mary discussed people I didn’t know, I listened to my older cousin’s conversations. Once I heard her trying to decide which place to go to that night.

“No, not that place, the men there have no feet,” Mickey said.

That really amazed me. For a long time, I pictured men perched on barstools without any feet.
By ten o’clock Dad would say, “Time to go pick up your mother from work.”
 We’d say “good bye,” and my imagination would have fun while Dad drove. I always hated to leave without a chance to see how Mickey looked when she made her dramatic entrance.

Some years later, I finally got to see Mickey at her youngest sister’s wedding. She had on a cream color dress with a rhinestone studded belt. Her silver shoes were open-toed and glistened slightly in the light. Her thick, dark, shoulder-length wavy hair was up in a chignon. Never one for subtleties, her earrings reminded me of the ones fortune-tellers wore.

She complained she wasn’t feeling well during the ceremony at the church that afternoon. She even did the unheard of, and missed the cocktail hour at the reception! I saw her lingering in the powder room through most of it. It seemed quite natural for her to be holding court there while penciling in her eyebrows and straightening her stockings.

Once that dance floor opened up and the band began to play, Mickey emerged an entirely different person. Her face was radiant. She emanated grace and confidence as she moved cat-like on the dance floor the entire night. Her ankle looked so dainty when she pointed to sidestep or turn. She could dance cha-cha, rumba, samba, anything.

Fascinated and entertained that night, I watched her dance with men and women, young and old. Everyone in my family said Mickey was odd, peculiar and slow. Funny thing, though, that night they all wanted to dance with her.

I sat and watched her fully understanding why she would never be caught in a place where the men had no feet.

Yvonne A.

March 29019