Moosing About

Moosing Around

Originally I thought I'd write about last weekend's experience with the Heartland Dancers but I found myself torn. As I started to put pixels to virtual paper I kept thinking I either needed to heed the sage motherly advice of 'if you don't have something nice to say don't say anything at all' or I'd need to apply a Dragnet-style disclaimer at the beginning of the post saying "the names of those involved in this story have been changed to protect their identity". While I debated this, my dear Kelly got to the keyboard first and put everything down, naming names and the whole shebang. So there I was with a partially written blog post and all the air let out of my scoop. What's a sharp-tongued fellow to do?

Well, in the absence of a target for my razor wit, I thought I'd pen something about our recent re-visit to the Shadeland Moose Lodge. You'll remember we attended the Indy Dancer's luau at the Moose and it was a bit of a wash in spite of being fun. No good for the knees dancing on concrete regardless of what kind of shoes you're wearing. This week we returned to the scene of the Hawaii 5-0 crime only we saw the inside of the Moose Lodge.

You know, until yesterday I'd never seen the inside of any sort of lodge. I didn't know what to expect - I mean there aren't any really good depictions of lodge life in the media (at least any of the media outlets I frequent), so the whole thing was a big mystery to me. I found myself coming off with visions of Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble in their Loyal Order of Buffalo hats and I wondered if the dance session would be emceed by some kind of poobah (grand or otherwise). Truth isn't quite as strange as fiction.

The inside of the Moose Lodge looked a lot like the inside of just about any other public building though with more patriotic symbology scattered about. There were flags and mentions of 'our men and women in uniform' on bulletin boards, there were photos of club events, and there were trophies - generally the makings of just about any sort of social organization you can imagine. In the back of the building was a bar and full dining room with a steam table. A few wizened and tired looking fellows lingered over their beers in the bar - maybe contemplating days when lodges like the Moose had memberships in the tens of thousands. Beyond the bar, a glassed off 'smoking area' was crowded with people. I imagine a separate smoking area would be about as alien as a lunar lander would be to the founders of the fraternal order - times have changed even if the Moose hasn't.

Kelly and I passed the bar and smoking area and crossed the lobby to the ballroom. The dance floor was small but still bigger than some of the venues we've danced and in a lot better condition than many of them. Around the darkened room were photos and paintings, depictions of lodge life which probably meant a lot to the initiated. To me they were untranslatable emblems of a dark and dying culture - curiosities that pulled at the part of me that loves old venues, old buildings, and almost forgotten histories. As we found a spot at one of the tables around the floor the usual club music started playing and some of the atmosphere drained away, soon we were sweating and dancing and totally ignoring our surroundings - lost in a song and worrying over whether to try a double spin or an arm bar.

If you get a chance to dance the East Side Moose in Indy, do it. No, Buddy Rich never played their stage and the feet of a dozen generations haven't graced their hardwood floor. There's still something special about the place - something from a time when a fellow could leave work at four o'clock, put on a fez, and take his best girl down to the lodge for drinks and a dance with a few dozen brothers. There's something right about that.