WOODSON BRANCH MERMAIDS AND PIRATES BALL
The high point for me today was the Woodson Branch Mermaids and Pirates Ball, a $15 fundraiser for the Woodson Branch charter nature school which has fallen on hard times this year. It was held in the large gym room of the Marshall high school studios, completely refurbished with globes of light strung on the ceiling.
It was an odd ball. At the center were children from 8 to 14 in all kinds of costumes, some pirates and some not, racing each other around the dance floor, bouncing off each other like a giant pinball machine with a few of the older girls awkwardly dancing and pretending to be 18. Around the edge of the ballroom the parents, mostly in costume, watched over their children with a few of the women dancing to the music. A kind woman persuaded a few of them to let me take their photographs and I am including them here.
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 