The creation of Facebook has resurfaced individuals and events from around Texomaland I haven’t thought about in years. It is great fun rekindling memories with photographs and stories from people who touched my life.
I received a friend request a while back from someone in Oklahoma and I could not place her. We had no friends in common and I did not know anyone in her hometown. I thought it must be a mistake, since the individual's photograph was of a little old lady and not anyone I knew. I deleted the friend request, thinking the sender had me confused with someone else. A while later I received a message from the same woman with the ominous question, “You don’t remember me, do you?”
She went on to detail a series of events from 50 years ago that slowly started bringing her identity into focus. At the time, she was living on a farm in Oklahoma with her family. They would come into the H-H supermarket where I was employed in Sherman for supplies and groceries. She remembered we were both around 17 and I seemed to make a point to visit with her every time they came in. (It was slowly coming back to me).
On one trip to the store, she and I went to their pickup to put the groceries in the back and I asked her out. She accepted, told me how to reach her farm in Oklahoma and we agreed upon the designated time. It all came back to me! This was an engaging, pretty girl, who I remembered as being articulate, curvy and witty. This was the same person who now looked like someone’s grandma? That’s because she is someone’s grandma! She now has lots of white hair? Lots of AGE! I still have a mental image of myself at 17. I cannot reconcile that image… with me taking out this old lady!
At that time in my life, I would have driven the family 1964 Ford Futura (kind of a souped up Ford Falcon) to the young lady’s family farm across the Red River into southern Oklahoma. I recall the sun was still up, said hello to all the family, promised we would be back before midnight and drove back to Texas. There were not a lot of options, so I suggested we go to the double feature B-movies at the Twin City drive-in. She was agreeable and I fortified us with popcorn and Cokes.
One of the downsides of the family car was there was a console between the driver and passenger seats. It challenged my creativity to come up with a plausible excuse to get into the backseat, to sit closer to a young maiden. I have done things like spilled coke on my seat, her seat or parked at an angle, where the view is not as good in the front. It took me a while to realize my dates knew exactly what I was doing and they were either going to get in the back seat or not. I did not have to go through these stupid, elaborate strategies.
As memory serves, it was not an issue with this vixen, this was not her first rodeo…she had been to the drive-in before. We got into the backseat, she was cuddly, enjoyed kissing and we sat through both movies with our hormones raging, but our virginity securely intact. It was a balmy Texas evening and on her own she determined it would be cooler, more enjoyable and more comfortable if she removed her tee shirt and accompanying (rather large for her age) bra. I was overjoyed. When the double feature came to a close, she groped around on the floor of the backseat, found her garments and slipped everything back on. From there, we drove back to her home in Oklahoma, with time to spare before midnight. We chatted on the way and agreed to go out soon.
As we pulled up to her house, the lights came on the front porch and her father stepped outside. We got out of the car, walked into the light, as he and I both looked at his lovely daughter. To my horror, her tee shirt was on inside out and backwards. It was dark when she pulled her shirt on and we remained in darkness until that moment. That “Fruit of the Loom” tag was staring at me like a shimmering full moon over the waters of Lake Texoma.
Everything went into slow motion! Her daddy slowly turned, looked at me with a tight smile and said, “Say goodbye to this young fellow honey, because you are never going to see him again!” The fear of God descended upon me…I wasn’t sure if he meant I was not allowed to call upon his daughter anymore or if he intended to drown me in his stock tank and bury me somewhere in his pasture.
Assuming the latter, I quickly bowed as I said good night, got in my family 1964 Ford Futura and drove back across the Red River as fast that poor automobile would go. I did not venture north of Texas for a long time, never saw them in the grocery store again and thanked the good Lord for saving me from an unmarked Oklahoma grave.
She said in her Facebook note, she watched me on TV when I went to work at Channel 12, saw me on the national Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon and remembered my name all these years later to look me up on Facebook. She was now a married mom, grandma and from her photo, looks like she is enjoying a happy life.
I asked if her father was still alive. She said yes, he lived nearby in a nursing home. That was nice, but we could not be Facebook friends. He impressed upon me 50 years ago, it would be in my best interest to disappear from her life. He may be in advanced years, but I retained enough trepidation from that evening to encourage me to continue to follow his edict.
Oklahoma seemed to mean trouble for you amigo!
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