Bad Dates II--Mr. HaySeed

Found here

I should have known something was afoot when my German professor called one Wednesday night after class and asked me if I would be willing to go on a blind date with a visiting student. "He's very musical, and I thought that since you aren't dating anyone, maybe you could encourage him to come to college here." Musical--how nice! Well, as I wrote in the last post, the guys weren't asking out the girls so I might as well go out with someone.
"Sure."

The plan was for him to pick me up at the dorm and we'd go over to the college auditorium to see a play. Then we'd go to Newton's in town for an ice cream afterward. Dr. B and her husband would join us so it wouldn't be awkward. I had nothing to lose. I just had to show up.

Saturday evening found me rushing back to the dorm after being out on a walk with a guy who I was truly interested in. He dropped me off and I ran into the lobby. What I saw should have prompted me to keep running right through the lobby and out the back door. There saw Charlie (let's call him that), sitting on the couch, legs akimbo, waiting for me. He had wild blond curly hair that hadn't been combed for awhile and he was wearing a bright red plaid hunting jacket over jeans tucked into galoshes. There was straw on the bottom of one boot.

"Hi, Charlie, I'm Barbara" I announced, reaching to shake his hand. "I have to change my clothes and I'll be right with you." He started to follow me down the hall. The desk monitor told him that he had to wait in the lobby. Oh dear. She later told me that he had wandered into the dorm through a back door and since he didn't know where he was in the building, he walked toward voices that came from a room with a door ajar. He knocked on the half open door and peered in. Girls screamed and pillows flew. They were lying around half dressed on their beds talking. Someone shooed him out and directed him to the lobby.

We hurried on over to the auditorium. The play was about to start. It was "Death in the Cathedral," which is a very meaningful and ponderous work. We were the last to be seated. As we hurried in to the FRONT ROW, it felt like everyone was looking at us and whispering, "Is that Barbara's boyfriend? Is he the reason that she isn't dating anyone here?"

I soon realized that Charlie couldn't follow the plot of the play. I was having a difficult time what with the old English language. It was way over his head and being in his company made me so distracted that I could hardly concentrate on what was happening. He leaned into me at one point and in a stage whisper asked loudly, "Do you get the gist of this?" I motioned for him to be quiet and told him I'd explain it at the intermission. He seemed satisfied with that and stared up into the rafters over the stage, and gawked around at the walls and at other people. Another time he asked loudly, "Do you follow this?" I cringed and made a face to show that I was having a hard time.

Dr. B and her husband were nice enough. They had saved our seats for us right in the front row, and thankfully, at the intermission they chatted with Charlie so I didn't have the whole burden of keeping things going. He didn't seem very bright or conversational. So I talked with Dr. B awhile, who directed me back to Charlie. "Charlie is very musical, Barbara. Charlie, tell Barbara about your musical interests." He smiled a toothy grin and said quite loudly, "I play the gittar. I strum it like a cowboy do." Oh good. And such an eloquent description, too. Musical, indeed.

We got through the intermission somehow. To put it simply and as kindly as possible, Charlie had almost no social graces and was in awe of his surroundings. He was truly "country come to town." I don't say that in a mean way. It was a fact that punctuated his comments that evening. But at my ripe age of 18, I was mortified and fearful of identification through association. It was going to be a long evening.

After the play finished, which I didn't enjoy at all, we loaded up into Dr. B's car and drove over to Newton's. This was the local Saturday night hangout for students at our college. Everyone who was anyone on campus showed up there, and that night was no exception. We walked through the door at 10:40 and were shown to a table on an elevation up above some of the other tables--right where everyone could see us together. Horrors! I thought I could probably survive having an ice cream and then get home and away from this guy. But no. He ordered a steak dinner, much to the dismay of the waiter. "We close in 20 minutes, sir" he said plaintively. Charlie replied, "Well if I'm in a restaurant, I want a meal." And that was the end of the discussion. The waiter slunk off into the kitchen and we sat there looking at one another. I was plum finished with small talk. This was back in the day when I was so reserved and had such an awful time talking to people I didn't know, that I was in knots inside. I ordered a Sprite and began sipping it quietly.

Charlie furrowed his brows, looked right at me and out of the blue, loudly announced, "Your lips are chapped!" People at the surrounding table looked our way questioningly.
I slid down into my chair. "Yes, I think they are," I said quietly, smiling at him with a please-be-quiet pleading look.
He was not to be deterred. "You should do what we do to them cows when they get chapped tits" he bellowed. At the word tits, heads all around us jerked our direction. Someone dropped a fork in shock. My face turned deep red. He continued, "We just take some of that Raleigh Salve and just slap it across their tits and they heal up in no time." He made a sweeping slap motion with his left hand and knocked his napkin onto the floor.
Scooping it up, he remarked, "There's no need at all for chapped tits or chapped lips." He smiled smugly, realizing that he had almost just made a rhyme. Dr. B's husband was looking at his hands in his lap. Dr. B looked apoplectic and I was aghast. "Charlie," she said quietly, "Tell Barbara a bit about your church up North."
Without missing a beat, he launched into a loud monologue about the membership and composition of his congregation. I hardly remember another thing about being in Newton's, except how happy I was to be leaving. We left with Charlis smacking his lips. He had eaten his steak dinner in 20 minutes (we didn't leave until 11:30) and we were on our way to drop me off at the dorm.

Uh oh--the dorm. That was where all the couples were saying goodnight on the steps and up against the porch railings. Many were making out as if it were the last night of their lives. If he got any ideas or even laid a hand on me I'd spit bullets. Soon we were making our way up to the dormitory. He surveyed all the heavily breathing couples writhing against the porch pillars, standing in front of me with his hands in his pockets. What would he do?

It never dawned on me that I could just say goodbye and walk inside. But to his credit, he was a gentleman. He reached forward to shake my hand and with his trumpet-like voice announced, "It was great to make your acquaintance, Barbara." The heavy breathing stopped and several sets of eyes looked our way.
"Thank you, Charlie." And I hurried inside.

That was truly an awful date: Charlie with who knows what stuck to the bottom of his boot, looking like was going hunting, and me dressed to the nines in a nice dress and high heels. Bless his heart--he just didn't know how to conduct himself and probably had never been in a setting where he could have learned how to behave socially. He reminded me of Gomer Pyle except his accent was decidedly different. Gawlee!

The next year, our small sextet singing group traveled up to his church to give a concert. There sat Charlie, waving at me from the third row, proudly sitting in the church next to his grandparents. The British guy who stood next to me in the group teased me all afternoon about Charlie after he saw him looking appreciatively at me and pointing me out to his grandparents.

After church there was a potluck before our concert. Apparently, his grandparents had brought their own lunch but didn't join the potluck for some reason. Charlie invited me out to the car where they were sitting, eating sandwiches. He introduced me and they were very quiet and stoic. Almost suspicious of me. Maybe to them I looked like a hussie in my ankle length singing dress. Who knows. Charlie didn't seem to mind. "Want a tomato?" he asked, handing me an enormous Beefsteak tomato that he could hardly hold in one hand. How on earth could I eat it and not get it all over my dress? I wondered. I politely declined and commented on what a nice tomato it was. "It shore is," he agreed. Biting into it like an apple, tomato juice and seeds sprayed in all directions. He hung his head over the ditch and let the juice drip off his chin. It just seemed to typify everything about Charlie, as good intentioned as he was. I excused myself and got back into the church.

I've thought about Charlie several times over the years. He was probably a very decent young man without any social opportunities. He could have been a late bloomer--later than I was. He could have turned out to be a True Blue kind of man: dedicated, honest, hard-working, loyal. Maybe he thought I was uppity or cold. In fact, I felt wretched being around him. As many teenagers, I didn't know how to let him be Charlie, and focus on being Barbara.

So I wish this dear earnest young man the best and hope his life has been a happy one. I think of him every time my lips become chapped.
Does anyone have any Raleigh Salve?