Chapter 6: Practice

In the past, when Andy Trainor had dared let himself dream of a life with Marilyn, it had always been of his leaving for work and coming back to her. In the spring of ‘78, he had a life with Marilyn. It was she, however, who left in the morning and came back to him at night. She was a practice teacher. She didn’t draw a paycheck, but she needed to spend all the hours at work that a teacher did, maybe more.

He, on the other hand, was still a student. Indeed, the competition was just slightly easier. They’d have job offers before they got grades for the last quarter of their senior year, and some of the students slacked off because of that. Most of the guys with whom he was really competing, though, still worked as hard as ever. They probably thought like he did; maybe they wouldn’t need the grades, but they would need the knowledge.

He’d begun the first quarter with two books read -- or skimmed -- over the summer. He had prepared for only one class this time, and that not nearly so far ahead. On the other hand, with Marilyn away so much, he had little to do but study.

They’d both made Dean’s List the previous quarter. Marilyn got copies of the list, circled their names -- which were together, and sent them to both families. One of her sorority sisters wrote them up for the paper. A married couple both on the Dean’s List was fairly rare. Of course most married-student couples were grad students, or so it seemed in their building of married-student housing, and the Dean’s List only covered undergraduates.

Marilyn and he went to the party celebrating the new ‘actives,’ full members of Zeta Gamma Tau. They were the girls who’d been pledges -- slaves to hear Marilyn talk about it -- just recently. Naturally, the party was important to Marilyn; it celebrated the continuation of her sorority chapter, the chapter to which she had given so much effort and attention -- too much effort and attention in his opinion -- over the past three years. Every once in a while, at the party, a girl would bring forward her date and introduce him to Marilyn. When that happened, Marilyn would say, “And this is my husband, Andy.” That was so nice to hear that he enjoyed the party as much as she did.

Actually, the party marked history for him. Marilyn had invited him to be her date at the party their freshman year. Some of the leaders of Zeta had told him that: “Marilyn has chosen you.” It hadn’t been true that early, at least not as true as he had wished it to be, but now Marilyn had chosen him permanently. Joyce, Marilyn’s Grand Little Sister, introduced them to her little sister, Terri.

Barry had come with Trish and Dave with Robin. That meant that there were two males he knew at the party. He spoke briefly to them, but they were more interested in dealing with the women they’d come with -- so, for that matter, was he. Marilyn left him briefly, however, to talk with Robin.

“Well,” she said when she’d returned, “our brief career as matchmakers seems to have panned out. I hadn’t heard about Dave.”

“Yeah, we talked after class. He wanted Robin’s phone number. Should I have told you?” Marilyn was interested in that sort of news, and he should remember that.

“Not necessarily.” Which gave him a pass in the pleasing-your-wife class, but not anywhere near an A.

Since he’d driven, he stuck to Cokes. He was actually happier with the excuse. Social drinking was just one more aspect of his culture that he didn’t understand. He sometimes needed to get soused and did so. He enjoyed his mind, however, and could see no reason to tune it down most of the time.

In the apartment, he got into the habit of washing dishes, sweeping and vacuuming the floors, and cleaning the bathroom while Marilyn was at work. That meant studying while Marilyn was there, but studying didn’t interfere with her actions. He took less than half the kitchen table, and he could watch her cook when he looked up from his books.

Then she came home with a new assignment. She was going to be teaching the sophomore class starting in a week. She had the books, and she was going to make a lesson plan. She fixed a double pot of chili to take care of his lunches; she’d buy hers from the school cafeteria. Every night they studied across from each other as they’d done before. Every night, after he made love to her, she slept in his arms. She was nervous about the teaching, and this nervousness was the only blemish in his enjoyment of those days.

She came in that Monday while he was reading about taking internal resistance into account. She looked frazzled. “And how was the first day actually in front of the class?” he asked. The short question needed a long answer, and she gave him that while she was preparing supper. The kids had tried the ‘why do we have to study this stuff?’ ploy, and she’d dealt with it. Dealing with it, she’d raised an interesting question. She was a bright girl. Instead of platitudes, she presented issues. She’d dealt with one ‘standard English’ -- was there really only one? It seemed to him that British English and American formal English were different balls of wax -- and many slangs and dialects. He was more conscious of professional jargon, or professional jargons.

“Well,” he said when she’d both run down and sat down, “that’s as good an answer as any. Really, each circle has its own branch language, and standard English is the connecting trunk. Regions have their own language; professions have theirs; age groups have theirs. Look at Dad’s lame joke about impartial differential equations, and that’s analysis. Electrical engineering may be a specialty, but analysis is the whole ball of wax, a trunk of its own.”

“You think everybody should know differential equations?” Well, ideally, yes. It was never going to happen, though. Look at those sorority girls who had struggled with simple algebra.

“Everybody should, at least, know the most important vocabulary of math ... and of other fields.” Well, maybe knowing the vocabulary of electronics was a less general need than knowing the vocabulary of physics. but... “I know what a gerund is. The wife of an EE should know what the reluctance of a circuit is.”

“Could I take a pass until I graduate?” She certainly had enough on her plate right now, maybe more than enough. She should have learned some things in high school, others in the hypothetical distribution courses that the University didn’t want their lib-arts students to take. This wasn’t the time to burden her.

“Sure. Right now, we both have enough to learn.” She certainly did, as she dug into her books. When she got up and put her books away, though, he did the same. He lifted her onto the chair for a kiss. She pushed him away to go into the bathroom, but she was waiting for him when he came to bed. She not only accepted his arm around her afterwards, she snuggled back into him so that was the only place he could put the arm.

While she was in the middle of her first real teaching, he got a letter saying he was invited to join Phi Beta Kappa. He didn’t think much of fraternities, but this one was different. On the other hand, the letter wasn’t very clear about how much it would cost. He knew that nothing was in the budget for that, not one red cent. He should consult Marilyn, but she had enough on her mind. He put it off.

There was another potluck at the church. Marilyn took greens and came home with some chicken that she’d traded the left over greens for. They had enough chicken for dinner Monday, and he ate the last drumstick -- cold -- for lunch Wednesday.

That Wednesday Marilyn went back to dinner at Zeta. She told him that Beverly had invited her. She left him food, but food wasn’t the problem. He wanted her company at mealtimes. Well, sulking when she was around wouldn’t make her any happier to be with him. He would do his sulking in private.

“Beverly has been pinned,” she told him when she came back. “We held a candlelight to celebrate. We all gather in a circle facing inward. Peggy -- or whoever is president when we hold it -- lights a candle and passes it around the circle. The girl who has been pinned blows out the candle. And when we got engaged, I let the candle go past once and blew it out at the second pass. That’s what we do for engagements.”

“Well, I guess that’s good news for Beverly. Are you sorry I didn’t have a pin to give you? Do I know the guy?”

“Well, we might invite the two of them to dinner. We probably should. A Saturday?” That answered the second question. “When one girl announced her pinning while we were deep in discussion about whether we’d be married last June or next June, I did think that we had much more commitment than the one she was celebrating. I didn’t really miss the first candlelight, though. I had a candlelight, and everybody already knew we were a couple.”

“Well, you handle the schedule. Give me a little warning, and I’ll vacuum the day before. Speaking of sororities and fraternities...” This seemed the time to ask her. “Should I join Phi Beta Kappa?”

“It’s not something you choose to join. It’s something you’re invited to join.”

“That’s what I mean. I’ve been invited to join. Should I say yes?”

“Andy! Nobody says no to Phi Bate -- nobody. It shouldn’t cost much, and we’ll get the money.” Well, that was the decision. He’d been sure that she would know what to do.

She was doing so much for him, and he realized that he was falling down on one commitment he’d made for her. She welcomed his lovemaking, and he’d promised her that he would learn a greater variety. Actually, he had learned all that various marriage manuals from the library could teach him. What he hadn’t done was practice them with her. Truth to tell, she was so sexy when she writhed on the bed under his hand or his mouth that he didn’t particularly want variety himself. And, too, she was working hard 5 days a week. Well, that meant that Saturday was the time for variety.

Basically, there were only two relative positions if they were going to have full sex. He had to be facing her and she should be either facing the same direction or facing him. The only differences were where they were and where his legs were in relation to hers. All they did facing the same way was with both of them lying on their left sides. They didn’t do it all that often, but it wouldn’t qualify as a variation. Probably lying on their right sides wouldn’t qualify, either. It had been fun with her over the back of Dad’s padded armchair, but nothing in the apartment was of sufficient height. It would also have to be something padded; he didn’t want to ram her soft belly against the hard back of a kitchen chair.

The first Saturday after he decided to try variety, though, he couldn’t follow through. Marilyn had invited Beverly and her guy, Terry, to dinner that night, and she was too involved in cooking before and talking afterwards for more than a brief, standard session that night.

Terry was a pre-med as well as a fraternity man. He showed the first more than the second as their guest. Rather than dismissing him because he hadn’t pledged, he talked about his science courses.

“Yeah, we have to know that stuff as background, and get fairly high GPAs to get into med school. Your sort of guys are real pains -- always busting the curve.” Well, he hadn’t busted any curves for pre-meds except in calculus. He didn’t think pre-meds took physics. His last courses in biology and chemistry had been in high school.