Mrs. Butts was either Cool Hand Luke or as stone deaf as advertised. I had just introduced myself and my dance partner as Donald Duck and Minnie Mouse, and she didn’t miss a beat.
It was the winter of 1978 or ’79, and Little Rock Junior Cotillion still reigned supreme from the ballroom of the venerable old Grady Manning Hotel, soon to be razed with the Hotel Marion to make way for the Excelsior.
The equally venerable and perhaps equally old Mrs. Roger G. Butts — I’m not convinced Mrs. Roger G. wasn’t actually her first name — founded the Junior Cotillion in 1948 and was, by then, a legend among the “established” families of Little Rock who wished to bestow upon their offspring the social graces that were, frankly, lacking at Star Systems and Godfather’s. (As eighth-graders, we hadn’t yet graduated to the big leagues of Murray Park. For those familiar with the movie “Dazed and Confused,” Murray of the late ’70s and early ’80s was Little Rock’s Moon Tower.)
Junior Cotillion was what the “in” crowd from the Heights and Pleasant Valley did (Chenal! didn’t exist yet; back then it was simply lonely, old Shinall Mountain).
Not that my family was “established,” nor I an “in” kid, by any means. But my mom went through Cotillion back in the day, and therefore, I had no choice.
Mostly though, whatever sliver of social legitimacy I hoped to attain — and therefore avoid banishment to the realm of boys who loved “Dungeons & Dragons” and girls who loved horses, and I was teetering as it was — rested on my participation in Cotillion.
By my eighth-grade year — year three in Cotillion regimen — Mrs. Butts (Roger G.) had been directing the show for a while, and was, well, showing her age. But she was doing so with much grace. Mrs. Butts didn’t lead the dance instruction anymore; she simply presided.
And presiding she was that fateful night. Waiting in line to pay respects to Mrs. Butts at the end of the night, arm-in-arm with the poor girl to whom I’d been partnered for the last dance, my job was to formally introduce us and say good night. Afterward it would be time to gather friends with whom I’d carpooled, get dropped off at Shakey’s, and adorned in church clothes that didn’t quite fit, engage in classic prepubescent ritualism — eat pizza (and at Shakey’s, watch ’em make it), play what video games were around in the late ’70s, and mostly, pretend like you belonged.
But first, the reception line featuring Mrs. Butts awaited. On this particular night, one of my friends (I think it was Tom Brenner) suggested while we stood in line that since Mrs. Butts was functionally deaf (not his exact words), you could say anything to her and all she’d do is nod and smile. His source for this information remains unknown to me. But, as I came to find out, it was good intel.
For some reason, echoes of “Tell her you’re Mickey Mouse, tell her you’re Mickey Mouse” remain etched in the memory of my approach to ground zero.
And tell her I did. Although it came out, “Good evening. I’m Donald Duck, and this is my escort, Minnie Mouse.” Or something very close to that. But nod and smile, she did. And we moved on.
I don’t remember the reaction of the hapless girl who got pulled into this silliness, but I do seem to recall she disappeared fairly quickly once we got through the line.