It was in 10th grade that I first asked a girl out on a date, Barbara Gray.  Barbara sat at the desk in front of me in my World Cultures class and I would occasionally speak to her, and I do mean occasionally for I really didn’t know what to say to her.  Barbara had the most beautiful long blond hair that cascaded down her shoulders to the middle of her back.  Classes at GHS were quite full, so the desks were very close together in rows with only an inch or so between a desk and the back of the one in front of it.  With Barbara’s hair being so long it flowed down across the top of my desk covering the pencil slot at the top.  I wanted to reach out and touch her hair but never did although I would use my pencil to move it out of the way so I could put my pencil in the pencil slot.  School had been in session for over six months when I decided to that I wanted to ask her out on a date.  I didn’t know anything about dating, having never been on a date before but I had seen from TV shows that the boy would come to the door to pick the girl up and would go to a movie and I had seen my sister Brenda go on dates but the only thing she said about them was they went to see a movie.   So, I decided I would ask Barbara if she would go to a movie with me.  I got the phone book out and looked up Gray, there were only two Gray’s listed so I picked the first number to call.  At that time, we had three phones in the house, the original phone hanging on the wall in the kitchen, a phone in Mom and Dad’s bedroom and the pink prince’s phone in Brenda’s room.  Well, I didn’t feel comfortable with using Mom and Dad’s phone and I wasn’t going to go into Brenda’s room to use her pink phone so that left the kitchen phone which didn’t have any privacy. That wasn’t a problem when I called the guys I hung out with but calling a girl was a different story, I didn’t want anyone to overhear.  I looked up what movies were playing in the paper and then one afternoon when no one was around I called what I hoped was the correct number and a woman answered and said “Hello”.  I could tell it wasn’t Barbara, so I nervously stammered out “Is Barbara there?” The woman answered “Yes, who’s calling?” and I answered, “Larry from school.” and the woman said just a minute, and I heard her call out, “Barbara, there is a boy on the phone for you.”  Okay, I got the right number, she was home, I got more nervous and started feeling more than a little bit warm.  After a moment she answered, saying hello and I blurt out, “Hi, this is Larry from school. I sit behind you in World Cultures.” and she responds in a less than enthusiastic tone, “Oh, hi.” Now I didn’t know how to talk to a girl, or what to say, so I ask, “How are you?” and she simply says “Fine.”  Okay, that wasn’t much of a conversation, so I get right to the point and ask, “Would you like to go to a movie with me?” and after a short pause she says, “I don’t think so.”  Not the answer I wanted to hear but the one I expected and after a short pause I say “Okay” and when she didn’t say anything more, I said goodbye and hung up.  I was actually relieved that she said no, I mean what was I thinking, I hardly knew her, plus I didn’t even know how I was going to pick her up and go to the movie anyway, probably would have to ask Mom to drive us.  It was just as well that she said no, I thought.  The next few days at school was a bit uncomfortable for me when I saw Barbara in class, I could hardly look at her, she didn’t say anything to me and I certainly wasn’t going to say anything to her, but that was no different then before.  I would not ask a girl out on a date again until after high school.

Updated: 10-15-2022

Summer