When you're 70+, that's easy to do.
I was a student at Sam Houston State University (that's what it used to be called) after graduating from Marlin High School in 1954. I had a scholarship in the band and played a brand new Selma saxaphone. When I got to school and found out they got up at 6 am to practice, well, I switched over to journalism. Back then it was a noble profession, unbiased and the young reporters always presented a news story fairly.
Sounds like fiction now.
Dan Rather was a graduate student and I, the undergrad, had a class with him. He was terrible boring and I think I made a C. He didn't get much more interesting as he got older and went on to reporting for television.
I was on the Houstonion staff and wrote a lot of articles. However a friend of mine, Lavonne (who knows has altzheimers and doesn't know me or anyone) was an artist and wanted to go down to Mexico City College between Mexico City and Cuernavaca, Mexico for the summer. We took our first train ride , catching it from Hearne, Texas. At the border, we changed to a sleeper car and rolled into Mexico City. The college was nestled on the side of a mountain with the class rooms overlooking beautiful scenery seldom seen in Texas.
Lavonne spent the summer painting and I was on the staff of the college newspaper. The name of the paper escapes me completely now. Well, what's new?
When the summer ended, I was offered a tuition and came back the following summer and graduated from there. Our days were passed in the press room. Bob S. was managing editor, I think. Bob was impressive with his stock of curly hair, a prominent jaw line and ever present pipe. I don't think he smoked it, but just dangled it from his mouth. We would go out and write our stories, then set them to type and pull all nighters pasting the stories and pictures to the page layout. We wrote the head lines and got it ready to send to the printers as soon as it was finished. Brita Bowen was our professor and editor in chief. She was tall and gray headed but very kind.
That was in the late 50's. I was much younger then and enjoyed a wild extra curricular activity. Lavonne was very religious at that time and had become friends with a young girl who had a dubious profession. She was slender, blonde and very pretty. Since we couldn't work in Mexico, she earned her money the old fashioned way.
Lavonne wanted to save her soul and we went with her to the Acapulco home of the Mexican presidents home. Miquel Alleman's handsome young son was there along with Nicky Hilton. Lavonne and I stayed in a separate bungalow on the property but our blonde friend went up to the main house.
Needless to say we didn't convert our friend but it was an introduction to the life style of the rich and famous. I later was an extra in The Sun Also Rises with Ava Gardner and Lana Turner. The pay was good since it was an American company and the atmosphere was exciting for a young Texas girl.
I took acting lessons with the famous director and acting coach Seki Sano.
Lavonne came home to finish school at Baylor but I got my degree from Mexico City College.
I always wondered what happened to Bob S. With the help of my computer genius daughter, she found Bob on facebook and he's returned to Mexico where he lives to this day.
He still has that scholarly air about him and that thick head of hair. Hair is important to me. Now, the hair is peppered with whisps of gray but still wavy and full. He still writes and has published several books and lots of magazine articles.
When you reach your 70's and many of your friends are no longer on this earth, it's nice to reconnect with friends from the past.
When we would take a break at the coffee shop, we'd order a slice of pie and Bob would eat the filling and I loved the crust. Funny, the things you remember.
Hi Bob, really nice to visit with you again. It's been fun catching up. Excuse my
"rabid" political views but it's fun to express them. You can yell at me, too.
No comments:
Post a Comment