The little blond girl up the street
February 10, 2004
Rich had just been in town for a visit. There was this girl that occasionally visited her grandmother who lived up the street from me and Rich�s visit coincided with her visit this time around. She was a little blond girl that I had known for a while and not really noticed, but boy did Rich take notice. He has always had a thing for blonds and I was more of a brunette man myself. That coupled with the fact that she was younger (maybe a year younger than Rich) and I knew her since she was in diapers made me overlook her. If you know Rich, he is the kind of guy that will expedite his needs if he wants it bad enough. I think I talked to him more in that one week in between visits than I did the rest of our lives. Each time, he would slip a little hint in; he would say things like, �Boy, that little blond girl was cute.� or �Hey Dan, have you seen that little blond girl again?� Each time he ignored me saying, �You know Rich, she doesn�t live there, she just visits her family from time to time.�
The next week came and Rich was in town visiting again. I�m sure he pestered his mom until she gave in and drove to visit her sister. We hadn�t had a quick a turnaround for a visit from the Rusts since my baby-sister was born in 1977. He borrowed my bike several times and rode up the street and I knew what he was looking for�that little blond girl. I also knew that she wasn�t there, but I never bothered to inform Rich of that fact. Then the questions started again. Rich had a way of never coming out and asking for something, but you knew exactly what he wanted after he was done. Finally, after playing cat and mouse for long enough, I asked him if he wanted me to talk to her for him. Of course he shrugged it off and said, �Yeah, if you want to.�
I�d like to say that this story has a happy ending, but I can�t�in fact, it is even worse than you may think and may not be the best choice for the first story to tell about us. You all know that I love Rich, but if you knew the Rich of the early 80s, the expression �babe-magnet� was never used to describe him until the 90s. With me, it was the complete opposite. I hit my peek in the 80s, but my coolness fell dramatically in the 90s. Why do you think I married my high-school sweetheart (who I started to date in 1986)? I tell you all this because when I approached Rich�s sweet little blond girl from up the street on the side of the Jacoby�s house it turned into a Mike Demone/Stacy Hamilton moment. I told her that �Rich thinks you�re cute�, and she said, �Well, I like you Dan� and started to kiss me. I�d like to say that I pushed her away, but I was a teenager. I did tell Rich what happened and he dismissed it, but I�m sure it was hard on his ego at the time. Because Rich did have a big crush on her, I never pursued the proposal more than that one kiss. Let me tell you that I saw her about 3 or 4 years later and she was a knock-out. She saw me and re-introduced herself with a big smirk all the time thinking, �See what you passed up�. I remember telling Rich that he owed me for that one and once he saw her again, he agreed. We had a good laugh about the whole situation and I think he said something about his eye for talent.
The reason I told this story first is because it is the oldest one I can completely remember. Obviously it doesn�t make me look good, but it does show some Rich-traits that were with him until his adult-hood. I could have told a good story of our young childhood that made me look better, but this was the first one I could remember. Besides, I don�t think remembering that I used to poke his Goofy shirt to make the eyes move or hug him so hard that he used to cry �Aunt Jude, Danny is hurting me� or use my Fisher-Price Farm as luggage or we used to play with legos until all hours of the night counts as stories. So this is it, the first installment of story-time with Dan. I hope you enjoyed it�more to come later. |
