Dancing is like dreaming with your feet. Constanze Mozart, Austrian singer and wife to the composer Mozart.
Soon-to-be-four, the preschooler, with brunette curls and a smile that grabs everyone’s heart, is very proud of her sparkly pink Mary Jane shoes. She may put her foot forward for the viewer to admire, but most likely, she’ll dance around in those glittery shoes. It’s as if the shoes make her dance. Or maybe, her dreams make her shoes dance. Even if she is sitting very ladylike on the couch, her feet are dancing on the floor. Whatever the impetus, she can’t keep still her feet in those tiny pink sparkly Mary Janes. Although she obviously can shuffle ball step, most often, the dance is extemporaneous with her skirt swirling as she twists and turns. She moves to her own beat in patterns she creates.
According to Heidi Murkoff, author of What to Expect When You’re Expecting, says, “all children are naturally attuned to sound and rhythm (one reason why music mobiles are so soothing to infants)…simply listening to music helps toddlers think and express themselves more creatively, a skill that’s sure to help your little one later in school. Plus, getting their groove on by dancing improves coordination and sense of how their bodies fit into their surroundings.”
As entertaining as this child is with her dance movements, I’m as fascinated by her shoes as she is. Everyone takes notice. Of course, little girls for over 100 years have worn Mary Janes, a dress shoe with a strap across the instep.
The Buster Brown shoe company, which took its name from a cartoon character, started out making sturdy shoes for boys in the early 20th century. Within a couple of years, designers had created a shoe for girls which they named after the cartoon character’s little sister, Mary Jane. The name stuck.
However, a shoe with a strap across the instep for both women and children dates back to the late 1800s. It just didn’t have a name. A photo of President Franklin Delano Rosevelt when he was a toddler in 1884 shows him in the then gender-neutral shoe with strap across the instep.
Of course, I grew up wearing Mary Janes, especially black patent leather ones for Sunday. On school days, I wore brown oxfords. My tap shoes, when I took dance lessons, were black leather Mary Janes. One of the family’s favorite stories about my dance lessons came from my attempts to teach my grandmother to tap dance with me.
The Mary Jane, or Baby Doll, as some dub it, has remained popular for over a century because, they are easy to put on, they will stay secured on the child’s foot, most are made of quality materials and today’s soles especially are slip resistant.
By the 21st century, shoe designers had begun to fashion Mary Janes with a variety of heels for women. And while the strap across the instep makes it true to the original child’s version, the height and shape of the heels plus the point of the toe leave people marveling how anyone could walk in such, much less strut about.
Celebrities from Sarah Jessica Parker to Beonce to Queen Elizabeth II have adopted the children’s style as their own. But it’s still a little girl in pink sparkly Mary Janes that made me stop and admire both her shoes and her dance.
Even I have a pair of silver Mary Janes, but mine have a heel as low as a child’s. And while mine may make me want to dance, I know my limitations now. Spinning in circles, step ball step, and heel toe heel will merely leave me dizzy. But I remember. And, I vicariously dance with the soon to be four-years-old brunette whose pink sparkly dancing shoes keep her feet a moving.
2022
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