“He rocks in the treetops all day long,

Hoppin’ and a boppin’ and a singin’ his song.

All the little birdies on J-Bird Street,

Love to hear the robin go tweet, tweet, tweet.

Rockin’ Robin!”

Howie was trying to boogie.  He was following steps cut out of construction paper and laid out on the black and white squares of the kitchen floor.  The prints were cut out of red paper to match the Red Robin of the song.  Meg read a magazine article explaining that color was an extension of a one’s personality, and it could be used to influence him.  She hoped Howie would be more inclined to learn if he liked the color of the song he was dancing to.

“That’s hogwash,” said Howie, glad that Emily didn’t fall for that kind of nonsense.

“It makes perfect sense,” said his mother.

They didn’t know Howie’s favorite color, so they were experimenting.  Red was favored by someone who was intense, exciting, and passionate.  Neither thought that sounded like Howie.  “Ugh,” said his sister.  “I don’t even want to think about it.”  But Louise and Meg liked red, so Howie was dancing to it.

Meg even sorted the records by color, but she could not figure out where to put ”Love is a Many Splendored Thing”.  Finally, she decided it must be plaid, and put it on the stack to be avoided.  Then she cut out shoeprints in colors to match the songs.  The cost of the paper to be paid for by what they were charging Howie for lesson.

“Only shake one leg at a time, Howie.  What you’re doing doesn’t look quite decent.  And point your left hand in the air,” his mother shouted above the music, as he jumped from square to square.  A portable record player was sitting on the countertop with the sorted stacks of records next it.  With the kitchen table pushed out of the way, the kitchen made an excellent dance floor.

Howie was dancing all by himself.  For the moment, Louise and Meg were content to watch, in safety from the other side of the table.

“Look,” said his mother to Meg.  “I think he’s doing it right!”

It was hard to be sure, because in middle of the kitchen was a fishing buoy with its warning light flashing on and off.  And when it went off, the kitchen was dark. 

Meg came out from behind the table to get a closer look.  “I can’t believe he’s doing so well,” she said.  “Wait!  Here is the reason.”  She stooped down and picked up one of the shoeprints.  “I accidentally gave him two left feet.”  She turned it over and laid it back down.  And Howie immediately headed off in the wrong direction. 

The buoy was only light flashing in the kitchen to give the room the feel of a real dance floor.  Meg and Louise loved it, although it made it difficult to see the steps.  Every time Howie missed one and jumped forward instead of back, Meg call out, “Howie, this is not the Swing!”

The buoy was another of Grandma’s gifts.  It was a memento from a long ago family vacation to Maine.  Grandpa Throckmorton bought it from a lobster fisherman, and brought it home strapped to the roof of the family car, with its light still flashing.  They made excellent time on the way home that vacation; cars kept pulling over and letting them pass.  The buoy sat Grandma’s parlor for years, making it very difficult to knit at night, but tolerating it because Grandpa loved it.  After Grandpa died, Grandma Ida gave it to Harvey and threw away the rest of her sea sickness pills.

The buoy was locked in the basement with the rest of Grandma’s gifts that morning, when Harvey left for work, but Louise was easily able to open it with a nail file, and the buoy was brought to the kitchen.  The first tune of the dance lesson was dedicated to it, a fox trot called “Harbor Lights.”

To Meg’s puzzlement, Louise brought all of Grandma’s gifts up from the basement.  “Aren’t you worried about Howie breaking them?” she wondered.

Her mother was peering inside a box when she answered, so Meg wasn’t sure she heard her right, but it sounded like she said, “I’m counting on it.”  They spent all morning down there opening boxes and sorting out what Grandma had given them.  Louise made a list in alphabetical order.  Then they carried them up and placed them throughout the kitchen.  Louise insisted, “It was to give the room the crowded feeling of a dance floor.”

Howie’s was dancing more stiffly than normal – even for him.  He ached all over from his collision with Butch Pratt, and his knees and elbows were wrapped with gauze.

*          *          *

The collision with Butch ended the game, winning it for Binnington, with Howie pitching a one hit shutout.  It was the best game pitched by Binnington all season.   Now, they were the league champions.

The band was playing and the crowd was cheering when he got up from Emily’s lap, and turned to face the reporter from the Binnington Gazette.

“That was a great game, Howie.  What do you think was the best play of the game?” the reporter asked.

Howie knew tagging Butch won the game.  But he was too modest to say it himself.  Better to let someone – like Emily – do it.  He made sure she was listening and answered, “I remember a sinking pitch I made to a batter that got him to chase a bad pitch to the outside.”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t remember that one,” apologized the reporter.  “I was thinking about the play Emily made in the first inning, where she made that fantastic grab behind third base, and throw the runner out at first.  That was awesome!”  The reporter turned to Emily and asked.  “Weren’t you nervous?”

“Not a bit,” she replied, getting up and dusting off her kneepads.  She was still in the catcher’s garb, and she looked very tiny.  “I did my home work.  I knew the batter was likely to hit it there, so I was already shaded towards the hole.  It wasn’t as hard as it looked,” she admitted modestly.  “And the first baseman did a fantastic job of picking up my throw.”  Emily believed in sharing the credit.

Forget the first baseman, Howie thought!   What about my one hit shutout?

“We were able to bail Howie out of the inning without any damage,” Emily continued.

BAIL HOWIE OUT OF THE INNING!  He was flabbergasted!

“You’re quite a ballplayer, Emily,” the reported replied impressed.

Enough with the modesty.  Howie asked, “What did you think of my stopping Cornville’s star player to end the game?  He was ready to take out the catcher, and I sacrificed my body to stop him.”  There!  And he had the skinned elbows and knees to prove it.

“You are right, Howie.  It was the bravest thing I ever saw!”

Howie puffed himself up.

But the reporter was talking to Emily, again.  “How could you stand there with that locomotive coming straight at you?  You’re a genuine hero!  You’re the bravest girl I ever saw, and the only one I know, who has played catcher on a boy’s team.  Do you realize Cornville did not get a single hit off Howie while you were catching? ”

WHAT?  Howie thought. I only threw two pitches to her, and they were both lobs.  I stopped Butch!  I saved the game!  It was Emily who let him get on base in the first place.  I sacrificed to save her!  Howie gestured with his skinned arms, and out loud he insisted, “The runner shouldn’t have even been on base in the first place!”  There!  Now the reporter had to realize Emily made an error, when she wasn’t paying attention to the game!

“That’s okay, Howie,” said the reporter, jovially slapping him on the back.  “So you made a mistake and he hit one off you.  We were all expecting it!  The surprise is that’s all they hit off you!”

He was stupefied!  He just pitched the best game of his life.  And Emily cost him a no hitter.  “But…but…but…” he sputtered.

Coach Buggese came up to them.  He turned to Emily.  “Are you alright?” he asked.

Emily nodded yes.

Then the coach turned to Howie,  “Throckmorton, I have just one thing to say to you.”

Now I’ll get some credit, Howie thought.  “Yes, Coach?” he answered expectantly.

Coach Buggese said, “The equipment manager had to take the other catcher to get stitches.  Do you think you could collect the bats and balls before you go home?”

Dejectedly, the pitcher of a one hit shutout started to collect equipment, as the cheering crowd made its way out of the stands and onto the field.  There they lifted Emily onto their shoulders, and carried her all the way home with the band, the cheerleaders, the reporter, Coach Buggese, and the rest of the team following behind.  As they headed down the road, he could hear them cheering, more and more faintly - “EMILY! Emily!”

When Howie finally got home, his mom and Meg were waiting.  They enjoyed cleaning his scraps, dousing them with hydrogen peroxide, and watching them bubble, before wrapping him in gauze, and insisting on the lesson.

*          *          *

 “Howie, are you paying attention?’ Meg asked.  She loomed briefly before him as the light flashed on.  She was holding the two plaid cooking mitts, plus a roll of duct tape.  She disappeared as it flashed off again.

“What is the duct tape for?” Howie asked.

In the dark, she stuck the mitts over his hands.  And when the light flashed back on, she made them sure by taping them to his arms.  “Now these will stay put,” she informed him.  “Do they hurt?”

Not now!  But they were sure going to when they came off; Howie knew he was going to lose some hair, but he just shook his head.

“Straighten your shoulders and stand on your tiptoes,” she reminded him, as she thumped him on the back.

He felt another lump forming.

 “Let’s try the Cha Cha,” his mom said.  “Meg, can you find one and put the correct steps on the floor?”

Meg looked through the stack.  “How about this one.”  She started singing.

“Yellow Bird.

Up high in banana tree.

Cha!  Cha!  Cha!”

“What personality is yellow?” Louise asked.

Meg held the magazine up as the light flashing.  “It says ‘Yellow is hopeful, imaginative, and happy’.”

Together they shook their heads “No!”

“That’s a shame!  And that means we can’t do ‘Yellow Polka Dot Bikini’ or the ‘The Yellow Rose of Texas’.”

“What kind of dance is the ‘The Yellow Rose of Texas’?”

“I think it’s a march.”

“Well, then it’s okay to skip that.  Only the bride and groom march at a wedding.”

“How about the ‘Tea for Two Cha Cha’,” said Meg.  “What color do you suppose that is?”

“I’m not sure,” responded her mother.  “It could be a green tea, a black tea, or even an herbal one.”  Louise shrugged her shoulders.

Meg put it back.  “Wait!  Here’s one called ‘Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White’.  Let’s see what the magazine says about those colors.”  She held it up to the light.  “Pink is easy going and White is clinical, simple, and private.  This is perfect!  We know Howie’s simple.”

“Hey!” he said.

Louise said, “Put the pink shoeprints on the white squares and the white ones on the black.  Howie had a hard time seeing white on white when we danced to ‘Harbor Lights’.”

“Dance with me,” his mother told him, when the flashing revealed Meg had finished laying out the steps.

She grabbed the thumb of his mitt and off they went.

“One!  Two!  Cha!  Cha!  Cha!”

Suddenly she pushed him towards the buoy.  With the light off, he couldn’t see.  Still he managed to miss it.

“Darn!  Two!  Cha!  Cha! Cha!” his mother said, as the flashing revealed the buoy still intact.

“Mom, are you sure Grandma was not upset that I broke the vase she gave you for your wedding?” Howie asked.

“I thought she might be.  Cha!  Cha!  Cha!  I’m sure if I’d broken it, she would have been, but since it was you… Cha!  Cha!  Cha…she did not seem upset at all.  She just said, ‘Boys will be boys.’  She said she was surprised you had not broken more gifts over the years.  I wish I’d known years ago.  And Cha!”

“How could I?  You keep them locked in the basement.  But it looks like they’re all out tonight.”  Howie looked around.  When the buoy flashed, the gifts could be seen throughout the kitchen.  It was crowded.  “Is Grandma Ida coming to visit?” he asked.

“No,” Mrs. Throckmorton replied.  “She can’t leave the farm right now.  She has a new mule about to be born.”

Grandma and Aunt Mae still raised mules on the family farm.  They were useful during the war when gasoline was rationed.  Grandpa farmed with them, and sold them to neighbor farmers.  He was good at training mules.  When he was alive, he claimed he could get a mule to do almost anything, even dance.  But now he was gone; the war was over, and the mules were pets.  Aunt Mae drove a tractor when she farmed.

Grandma and Mae had the habit of naming their mules after family members.  One roan colored mule was named Horace, after Grandpa.  And Aunt Mae named another one Steven, after her fiancé killed in a bombing raid over Europe.  The ornery sire donkey was called Harvey.

“Aunt Mae is excited to hear you’re going to dance at the wedding.  She says she hasn’t danced in ages.  She claims she practices while she feeds the chickens.”

Howie groaned.  He hoped she wasn’t expecting to do that Chicken Dance!

The Cha Cha came to an end, and Meg said, “Let’s play this one and we won’t have to change the prints.” 

Louise understood when she heard:

“A white sports coat, and a pink carnation.

I’m all dress up for the dance.

A white sports coat, and a pink carnation.

I’m all alone in romance.”

“Howie,” she said.  “This dance is called a stroll.”  And off they strolled among the gifts.

Farmers usually take their vacations in the winter when the farm cannot be worked.  Among the vacation gifts was an aardvark cookie jar, a souvenir from a family vacation to Texas, and an ivory Buddha with a clock in its belly from San Francisco’s Chinatown.  A ski trip to Minnesota was the origin of a large blue ox named “Babe”.

A set of five signs from the prairie states read:

“She eyed his beard.

And said no dice.

The wedding’s off .

I’ll COOK the rice.

Burma-Shave.”

A painted conch shell came from Coney Island, while an elephant’s foot umbrella stand came all the way from India through of a riverfront bazaar in New Orleans.  A Spanish guitar was from Mexico.  A log cabin birdhouse was bought in the Smoky Mountains of Virginia.  Various state spoons were in a cigar box.  A paperweight turtle came from South Beach, Florida.  And a Totem pole with a bird on top was obtained in Alaska.   And, of course, the buoy was from Main.

Among the gifts was a partial set of fine china, a carnival portrait of Grandma, a Moose head with antlers, a silver and blue wig, and a green bowling shirt from Grandpa’s hometown.  There was also a butter churn, an apple press, two hubcaps from a 37 Buick, an automobile jack from the same car, and a giant kite capable of lifting a small child.  Plus, there was a model of a ship in a bottle, a leather motorcycle helmet, a slide trombone, a xylophone, a cradle, a quilt, and baby doll with an arm missing

Harvey insisted the doll was Mae’s.  But Grandma Ida remembered him sleeping with it.

Last of all, there was a cylindrical metal object that looked like a World War I hand grenade.  Howie was especially determined to stay away from that one!

In the pocket of her apron, Louise had the complete list, in alphabetical order, and a pencil.

When the music stopped, Meg exchanged the pink and white steps for some brown ones.  “Brown is reliable, steady, and dependable,” she informed them

“That sounds like Ira Hinton,” responded Louise.

“This is dance is called the “Shimmy,” said Meg.

And the record player started playing, “Shimmy!  Shimmy!  Coco pop!”

Oops,” said Howie, “I almost stepped on the picture of Grandma.”

 “Drat!” muttered Mrs. Throckmorton as she shimmied Howie around the floor.  “Missed!”

She needed a dance with more movement to it.  “What have you got that’s livelier?” she asked Meg.

“How about this one.”  Meg handed her “Flying Purple People Eater.”

“What personality type is purple?” Louise asked.

“Arrogant,” responded Meg.

“I suppose you’d have to be, if you’re going to eat people.  “What are we going to dance to it?”

“I think the ‘Mash Potato” or maybe the ‘Monster Mash’ is more appropriate.”  They both laughed.

Howie did not get it.  He thought the monster dance was the Boogie.  And he stared to gyrate.

“No, Howie,” said his mother.  “That is the wrong dance.  Go up on your tiptoes and twist your feet.  No!  Don’t flap your arms!”

As the record started played:

“It was a one eyed,

one horned,

Flying Purple People Eater”,

His mother grabbed Howie’s mitt, and they began to mash around the buoy, just as it flashed off.

When it came back on, Howie could see they were nearly on top of several gifts.

The portrait of Grandma was leaning against the cradle where the baby doll lay wrapped in the quilt.  In front of the cradle were the butter churn and the Buddha clock, wearing the silver and blue wig.

The buoy flashed off as they rounded them and headed to another part of the floor.

RIP!

In the dark Howie bumped the kite.  Now it was impaled on the antlers of the moose head, with its tail dangling uselessly on the floor.

The moose head sat on top of the apple press.  And it was wearing the leather motorcycle helmet.  The aardvark cookie jar was hanging by its tail from the other antler.  And the turtle shaped paperweight sat beneath its nose.  The ship-in-a-bottle was harbored, port side, near its left ear.

Mrs. Throckmorton stopped and took the list out of the pocket of her apron, and drew a line through the word “Kite” with her pencil.

“Oh dear!  Howie ripped the kite!” she said.  “Please take it out and throw it away for me, will you, Meg?” Mrs. Throckmorton asked, as she started off with Howie again.

Fortunately, the buoy flashed on just as Howie was about to mash onto the grenade.  If he had slipped on it, he could have collided with some of the heavy objects on the far side of the room: the automotive jack, the blue ox, the trombone, and the xylophone.  But he was able to hop over it. 

“Howie,” his mother said dreadfully,  “Don’t make up new steps!”

CRASH!

He missed the Elephant foot umbrella stand and managed to avoid the Spanish guitar.  But the china plates were broken when Howie kicked the two 37 Buick hubcaps into them, just as the dance ended.

Meg swept the bits of china into the dented hubcaps and carried them all out to the trash, while Louise crossed both china plates and hubcaps off her list.  Howie wiped the sweat of his face with a mitt.

When Meg came back in, her mother was looking uncertainly at two records: “Tutti Frutti” and “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”

“What colors are these?” Louise asked.

Meg said, “I think they’re plaid, also.”

Louise put them on the stack to be avoided.

Meg picked up one of the blue records.  This stack was the largest.  “Blue,” she told her mother, “is a person who scientific, steady, and marriageable.”

“Possible,” said her mother.  “Put one on.”

Soon it became a blue nightmare, as they danced around the buoy in darkness, and in light. 

The Buddha and the wig were the next to go.  They were destroyed while rocking to “Blue Suede Shoes”.  The aardvark became road kill doing a two-step to “Blue Moon of Kentucky”.  And the ship was sunk on the “Blue Danube”.

Dutifully Meg trudged in and out, hauling more and more debris to the trash.

Gleefully Mrs. Throckmorton crossed gift after gift off her list with her pencil.   She was glad she alphabetized them.

“What other blue records have we got?” she asked

“How about ‘Blue Christmas,” Meg suggested.

“I think it’s too early in the year for Christmas music.”

Meg moved it over to the avoid stack, along with “White Christmas” and “Silver Bells”.

Mrs. Throckmorton said it was time for Meg to dance with Howie, as she put on a waltz.

“Just a minute,” Meg said.  She went over to the moose head and picked up the leather motorcycle helmet.  And she put it on her head, carefully tucking her hair up underneath it.  She wasn’t taking any chances!  Now I’m ready,” she said, buckling it under her chin.  She was already wearing the army boots stuffed with newspaper.

She put a hand on Howie’s shoulder and with the other grabbed the thumb of his mitt, then she started to count, “One, two, three.  Two, two, three.”  And off they went.

While Howie wasn’t looking, his mom nudged the portrait of Grandma Ida away from the cradle, closer to the center of the room..

“The waltz,” Meg was explaining to Howie, “is in ¾ time.  Follow me and count.  Left, two, three.  Right, two, three.  Left, two, three.  Right, two…  Oops!  Howie, now what have you done?”

Howie was standing in the middle of the floor, with Grandma’s portrait stuck around his ankle.

“Oh Howie,” cried his mother.  “You didn’t…  Oh what will Grandma Ida say?  I know I should have put the painting somewhere safe.  But as Grandma says, ‘boys will be boys’.”  Mrs. Throckmorton took the list out of her pocket and drew a line through the words “Hideous Picture”.  Then she crossed through it twice more for emphasis.  After putting the list back in her apron pocket, she reached over and yanked the frame off Howie’s foot.

“Meg, keep dancing with your brother, while I take this rubbish outside and throw it in the trash.  Oh this is so bad!  What will Grandma say?”  But she was smiling as she left.

Mrs. Throckmorton reentered the house to find Meg and Howie dancing with apparently no further damage.

“Did you break anything while I was gone?”  She looked hopefully around the room.

When Howie wasn’t looking, she slipped the turtle-shaped paperweight off of the olive press.

CRASH!

“Howie, you just have to learn to be more careful!”

 “Mama,” Meg complained, “what are we having here, a dance lesson or a destruction derby?”

“Oh dear,” her mother replied.  “Do I have to choose?”  She bent down and swept up the damage.  “Never mind.  Take Howie around the room one more time, and we will call it a lesson.

She went over to the player and put on the “Blue Tango”.  Then she counted out the rhythm, “One, two, three, four, AND.  Two, two, three, four, AND…”

Meg grabbed Howie’s thumb.  And while holding both their arms out straight in front of them as stiff as board, she led Howie around the flashing lamp.

“I’m sorry, Meg.  Was that your foot?” came Howie’s voice out of the darkness, during one of the blackouts.

“Ha!  I can’t even feel it with these boots on.  Howie, do your worst!” came the courageous reply.  Meg made a right turn and headed in another direction, as the buoy continued to flash on and off.

“One, two, three, four, AND...  Two, two, three, four, AND…  Howie, were did you go?”

In the dark, Howie’s foot finally tangled with the hand grenade.  There was a musical arpeggio, starting from a low note and proceeding to the higher ones, as Howie struck up an acquaintance between with the xylophone and his head.  At first he was glad he had not landed on his elbows or knees, but by the end of the rift he wasn’t sure.

They saw him grimace in pain before the light disappeared again.  During the next flash, they saw the blue ox start to fall.

Mrs. Throckmorton crossed her fingers and waited.

But the ox didn’t hit the floor.  Instead it gored Howie in the stomach.

Oh dear, his mother thought.

“Oof,” he said, as he bent in the middle.  When his head snapped back, it played a minor cord that echoed eerily in the dark, and in the light, and then in the dark again.

The ox bounced back and hit the slide trombone, which slide and tripped the release on the automobile jack.

The buoy was flashing on, as the jack head slipped.  But it was dark when it hit the floor, after falling straight down the stem.  There was no damage.  But it made such a clatter that Meg jumped.  Now she bumped into something in the dark.  When the light flashed back on, they could see it was the Totem pole.

“Timber,” her mother yelled, as it landed on Meg’s boot and broke in two.

As the buoy flashed on, the bird from the top of the Totem could be seen flying straight at it.

CRASH!

The record ended.  And all was silent.  And all was dark!

In the dark, there was a rustle of paper, as Mrs. Throckmorton crossed both “Totem Pole” and “Fishing Buoy” off her list.  Then a thin beam of light penetrated the gloom.  It came from a small flashlight Mrs. Throckmorton thought to carrying in her apron pocket.  The beam revealed that Howie was gone.  In his place were a pair of plaid cooking mitts and a wad of duct tape with tuffs of red hair sticking to it.

Meg found a kitchen chair, where she sat moaning and holding her foot.

Mrs. Throckmorton shined the beam over the kitchen wall until she found the switch, and turned it on.  With overhead light restored to the room, she stood and surveyed the damage.

It was good!

Mrs. Throckmorton hauled out the wreckage of the buoy.  When she returned, she had a wheelbarrow, which she used to haul off the Totem pole, whistling as she did so.

Then she set about putting the kitchen back in order.  She moved the table to back to where Meg sat nursing her foot.  And she rearranged the other chairs around it.  She twirled the Lazy Susan; to be sure no damage had been done there.  She collected the cooking mitts and replaced them in a drawer.  Last she put the record player and the records away in a closet.

With the room back in order, she stood with her hands on her hips and surveyed what gifts remained.  Decisively, she picked up the baby doll in one hand and the moose head in the other, and dashed them both to the floor.  “I’m sure Howie meant to break these,” she said.  And she dragged their broken caresses outside.  The rest of the gifts, she set in the hall at the top of the basement stairs, for Mr. Throckmorton to haul back down when he came home.  Finally she went over to Meg, pulled out the chair beside her, and sat down.  She was satisfied!

Meg ceased moaning and put down her foot.  She reached up and removed the helmet, fluffing her hair out as she did so.  Then she started to cry.

Mrs. Throckmorton hugged her daughter.   “I know, I know, Meg.  It is a little discouraging.  But maybe we have taught Howie all he is going to learn.”

She remembered to pull out her paper, and cross baby doll and moose head from the list.  It was a very good day!  She thought for a moment.  She crossed out another gift, then went out to the hall, and smashed the Spanish guitar to pieces. 

She returned to Meg, after disposing of the instrument.  “What dances can he do and we will have the band play mostly those tunes,” she suggested.  “How was he on the Tango?”

Meg pointed to her foot.

“Oh, dear!  And the Cha Cha?”

Meg referred to several gifts on the list.

“Oh dear!  Can he do the Waltz?”

“He needs three feet.”

“That won’t do,” her mother responded.

 “Jive? Swing? Shimmy?  Boogie?”

Meg shook her head no, no, no, and NO!

“The two step?”

“He has two LEFT feet!”

Mrs. Throckmorton was feeling guilty.

“Jitterbug? Foxtrot? Twist?”

Meg kept shaking her head.

“The Bunny Hop?”

“Not even that!”

“And we never did try to teach him the Chicken Dance did we?”

 “Oh, Mama!” Meg wailed.  “Howie is going to ruin my wedding!”