Chapter 20

Friday was a good day at school. We had several exams, but they all seemed easy. I think any exam is easy if you know the answers. At the end of the day, there was a pep rally for the football team. They had a good start to the year even without my being on the field.

Since it was an away game at Findley I didn’t go to the football game. The youth center was open as usual and I went there to just look around, and to see what was happening.

Eleanor Price was there and I about fell over when she came up to me. She got right to the point.

“Ricky, next week is the homecoming game and dance. Do you have a date?”

“No, I don’t,” I said cautiously.

“Janet Huber doesn’t have a date, and would say yes if you asked her.”

That is how I learned how the world of first dates worked for us. An intermediary that knew both parties would make the first overture. That way there would be no outright rejection. I could choose not to ask her, and she would not be publicly rejected. If I asked her I knew she would say yes unless it was some cruel trick.

Janet had been a classmate for year’s so I wasn’t worried about a cruel trick.

I told Eleanor, “I think I would like to ask her.”

“Oh good, she is sitting in the booth on the end.”

Now I had gone to school with Janet for years, but I guess I had never really looked at her for a while. My image was short and skinny with knobby knees. They really ought to send out updates to us guys on every girl.

Janet was now tall and thin and really filled out on top. Her hair was down to her shoulders and she had short bangs. The most important thing she was cute! Even though I knew this was supposed to be a sure thing I was still nervous walking over. Give me a Brahma bull any day.

I asked Janet if I could join her. She scooted over so I could sit next to her. The booth would hold six, three on each side. There were four other girls with her. Oh great, a public performance.

I figured just get it over with, “Janet, I don’t have a date for the homecoming dance, would you be interested in going?”

She opened her mouth to say something, then changed her mind and gave me a simple, “Yes.”

I said, “Great, now what were you really going to say?”

“My friends dared me to tell you I had to wash my hair that night.”

“Oh if you did that you couldn’t go to the dance, you would catch your death.”

This got all the girls giggling. We then got into the mechanics of the date.

I would pick her up at her house on Friday before the game, we would go somewhere for dinner, then return home to change for the game, go to the game, return to her home so she could change for the dance. I could drop some clothes off at her house to save time on my changing.

Oh yes, buy a wrist corsage from the juniors, they were selling them to raise money for the Prom.

I don’t think General Patton had such logistic issues.

I was asked what I was going to wear.

“Is a tux required or is a suit okay for the dinner and dance?”

“A suit would be fine. What color is it?”

“Grey with gold edging.”

“You have a suit with gold edging?”

“It is the one I wore on American Bandstand, a modern cowboy suit.”

As luck would have it, the jukebox started playing, Rock and Roll Cowboy. I thought the girls were all going to have a cow the way they squealed.

I had a brainstorm. “For dinner would you like to go to the Country Club?”

“Are your parent’s members?”

“No, I’m on the golf team and have membership privileges during the season.”

That I was on the golf team was news to everyone at the table. You could see my social status going up quickly.

“That would be wonderful.”

“I will ask my dad if he will drive us around, or we can take a taxi.”

“That would be good because my dad is on duty at the fire station that night. That reminds me, he wants to meet you before we go out.”

“Okay but he has known me since we were in the first grade.”

The girls promptly disabused me of prior knowledge. I was now an official date and had to be properly looked at, it was in the Dad’s Handbook! I would have to ask my dad to borrow his copy.

We talked for a little while, I told them how my golfing career had just started and that my first match was tomorrow at Urbana. I then spent time asking the various girls questions about themselves.

I had watched Elvis and Tab Hunter get to know girls this way. They were successful until the boyfriends showed up. I kept a lookout of the corner of my eye to see if any boyfriends were charging my way. At least I had bail money on me.