Old Flames - Stories from the Attic

In our great attic clean-out, we came across several boxes full of keep-sakes -- old photos and such. From those, I have mined some blog stories. 

Among the pictures from my high school days were a few of old girl friends. That's certainly not surprising, since I was a handsome devil back then and a BMOC as well. Well, sort of.  I blogged a couple of years ago about the girl with the unusual name, Amala Knight. You know, the one that caused my mother to think I was corresponding with a motel chain. Here's a picture:

Yes, I know that is the back of her head, but if you go back and read that blog you'll find that Amala is not her real name anyway, and to preserve her privacy, I turned the picture around.

And I found a picture of Sandy from San Angelo, but since I know she is active on FaceBook, I'll not post it, either. Sandy and I met when she came to town to visit an Aunt (do you see a pattern here?) and we did have a few actual dates. I even drove to San Angelo once to spend a weekend with her and her family. Alas, it was not meant to be. Sandy went off to UT, and I went to ACU.

My favorite story about Sandy involves J. C. Post, a guy from church and fellow classmate. We both had old beater autos that looked somewhat alike, and one Saturday night J.C. and his date and Sandy and I all ended up at the same movie theater. Not too hard - there was only one theater in town. When we came out, it was pouring rain, so the guys all ran for their cars and drove by the front of the theater to pick up our respective dates.

Sandy, seeing what she thought was my car, ran out and jumped in - with J. C. - and he promptly drove off with her. I was right behind him, and I saw what happened, as did J. C.'s date, so she came and got in my car and we drove off as well. I knew that J.C. was going to the Dairy Delight - that's where everyone congregated after the movies, so after a while I pulled into a drive-in space next to J. C. I was getting worried that Sandy might choose to spend the rest of the evening with J. C., but we managed to get our dates sorted out, and all ended well.

And then there was Madelyn. I honestly don't remember her last name. She moved to town late in my senior year, and a bunch of guys tried to date her. I did get her to agree to go to the Senior Banquet with me, but the weekend before, she was out with someone else and they hit a cow in the road, and she broke her leg. No Banquet for her, no date for me!

What is outstanding about Madelyn is the "Love, Mother" picture. Madelyn had modeled professionally in the big city where she lived previously, and she had a bunch of 8X10 photos made up of modeling sessions that she used to promote her modeling career. She gave me (and every other boy in school, I think) one, and I took mine with me when I left for ACU.

Pin-up pictures were not permitted in the dorms, and I caught some flak early on because of the picture, so I signed it "Love, Mother" and claimed that it was a family portrait. See what you think:

Can you see the family resemblance? The ink has faded in 50+ years - you can just barely make out the "Love, Mother" signature. Since the dorm checker stopped hassling me about the picture being up, I thought I had really pulled something off, until my real mother came to visit my room. She was not amused. By the way, you get to see Madelyn's picture because she handed out dozens of these and sent them to every TV station in the state. No privacy issues here.

But the woman who really pursued me was.... Anita Bryant. Yes, that Anita Bryant, the singer. I told you that I worked for a radio station in Abilene, and I got to interview lots of celebrities, Anita among them. Here's a candid shot of the two of us in the VW bus that was decked out for remote broadcasts.

You can tell from the look on her face that she is just in awe of me. I had that effect on older women. The problem was, not long after, I began dating Barb, but Anita just would not leave me alone! She would write me love notes and send me cards, and of course, Barb would see them. No really. Look:

 And...

Notice the 3-cent stamp. Love was cheap in those days! I finally had to tell Anita that I had found the love of my life, and she was just going to have to deal with it, hard as that may be!