DIED 2012
HE IS SLIM, STRAIGHT, and smiling in a black tuxedo jacket; she is a cloud of organza, a single pale hand resting on his upturned palm. These two have been practicing this dance since before she could read. Off to the right, fine young men in bow ties stand like a barbershop quartet, arms outstretched, mouths wide. Waltz across Texas with you in my arms, waltz across Texas with you. The one with the boutonniere has just become her husband.
By the time I met her at the software company, that wedding photo had become a painting above the grand piano on the wall of her living room. Behind the bridal mufti, she had perfect posture, a steel-trap mind, and a no-bullshit attitude; he was an excellent if not very humble writer who barricaded the house during football games. There were many good parties there, but the marriage had no more luck than his Houston Oilers, and before long the song we were dancing to was “D-I-V-O-R-C-E” by Tammy Wynette. My friend’s daddy danced at her wedding, he danced at her divorce party, and he’d dance at her next wedding, too. Whatever makes you happy, honey. You go right ahead.
My friend’s father was from a town that no longer exists called Concrete, Texas. He grew up speaking German, picking cotton, plowing fields, and riding a horse to school. Then siphoning gas out of the tractor to start the truck. His mama got one of those female cancers and died when he was fourteen; long after he grew into his Stetson, he still wept to think of it. By then he could talk to anybody about anything, sell them a mule, beat them at poker, and congenially mispronounce their name throughout their entire acquaintance. He taught three daughters to dance; my friend was the baby.
But I don’t know how, I protested the first time my friend grabbed my hand for a two-step. Pshaw, she said, steering me out onto the floor. For a hapless East Coast shimmy-shaker like myself, dancing with these people is like embracing a moving tree. You just hang on to the branches as they dip and whirl. Don’t be fooled by the cloud of organza—the girl in that painting has all her daddy’s moves. All the time he was training her to follow, he taught her to lead.