Toe Jams and Dust In Her Hair

Toe Jams stood at the arbor and watched this Southern Plains Traditional Dancer walk toward him. Her buckskin was white with blue and white cut glass beads, they glistened under the lights, her eagle feather fan was swinging at her side, and she carried a shawl on her other arm. The ringes on her buckskin were long; they nearly dragged on the ground but hung just above it. A small breeze came up whipping up the dust and it swirled around creating a dust cloud and it looked like she was walking on air.
She came to the arbor and saw him standing there, this Singer with the Prairie Island Pontiacs.

She stepped over to him and said. “I was out there thinking on how to dance good…but I kept thinking …how come they call him Toe Jams…so tell me how you got that name”

He said to her; first tell me your name “Dust in Her Hair?”
She laughed and said, Winona Not Afraid, but the call me “Winny”
Toe Jams said ”We all went to Chilocco Boarding School", motioning to the drum group, "Way down in your country, Oklahoma, and we got these tennis shoes, donated PF Flyers from some church people. I used to wear them around and when I walked across the tile floors they made this “squish” “squish” sound like, you know, they sound like your feet are all wet, but they weren’t wet.

You could hear me walking down the hall. One of the dorm aides saw me coming and said, “You better do something about those “toe jams”, after he said that the name stuck and that is what I am called now by everybody. How about you “Dust in Her Hair” where are you from?”

She heard her mother calling to her, “Winny!” They could see her standing by the judge’s stand, her mother said, “They want you to dance again, you and “Bones”. She looked at her best friend “Bones Small Eagle” and they turned to go back out into the dance arena. She turned to wave at him, but he had disappeared into the crowd, his drum group calling him over.

The announcer said, “We have a tie in the Young Women’s Traditional, Southern Plains style, so we have number 341 and 430 that are going to dance off!”, the announcer continued and said, “O.K. Prairie Island Pontiacs from the Windy City, Give Us A Good Contest Song!”

There was a wail’ it was loud and it carried far, and in a flash the drumsticks all came up over their heads and banged down on the drum, They sang a song, an old contest song from years ago. Winny stood there and remembered her father used to sing that song, years ago with his drum group Southern Cross, she knew it well. She turned to start stepping into the song slowly making her moves slow and graceful, putting the eagle fan to her forehead and moving it to the night sky fanning away and remembering the way her father used to sing.

The crowd in honor of the young women dancing traditional stood up and took off their hats as the two young women made their way around the arena, slowly, dancing softly on the hard ground, and their buckskins with long fringes swaying with the steady beat. She could hear him, his high pitched voice, the one they call Toe Jams. “He can sing…sing like the old timers” She had heard his voice just a little bit but knew the sound of his voice, it was a good song.

She concentrated on the dance, moving in the steps of her mother and grandmother. It was a contest song, but also a dance of unity, of remembrance, hope and of honor. Tying in the old and the new, from across the plains they had come and she was ready. She looked to the right and saw her friend “Bones” next to her.

They had practiced together when they were small growing up side by side. Both of them had lost their fathers and they danced together all these years practicing day in and day out over the long winter, and in the fall. Bones came along side her and the two of them danced side by side.
Winny looked at her and Bones smiled and they danced side by side, together in perfect harmony, it was like watching twins moving as one. Bones had decided there would be no clear cut winner and Winny knew it too, and so they danced in perfect step with each other.

She cleared her mind and closed her eyes and they danced as they did when they were children and their fathers sang for them. As they danced around the circle, the sound of other drums groups hitting their drums in recognition of their desire to finish together pounded out, a sign of respect. Dancing exactly alike was something not seen at all from those competing to win.

The shrill of eagle bone whistles came up like a flock of eagles taking flight. It was dusty, and in the distance there was thunder and lightning, a steady rumble coming from the East, then went to the South and then the West. Aho!, the crowd said, and the drum groups, 12 of them all together, they all began to join in and sing and the high voices of women singers from the crowd came in and the pow wow grounds was in a place beyond any contest.

They all knew the song and they sang it together and it was no longer a contest song but an honor song. And so it was on that night long ago. There was no winner it was a tie.

Afterward the drummer Toe Jams and Winny walked over to the stew stands together to have a burger and coke. They walked slowly together and talked the night away, "Two Jams" and “Dust in Her Hair”...
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