Dating

I remember one event in High School that might be called a “date”. A classmate Gerry (sp?) Gerrity arranged a small party and brought girls, one for each. We may have kissed or not. Don't remember her name. The members of my high school graduating class at our last two reunions remember there being a dance (“prom”). I don't. One, Fr Ray, remembers my mother pinning a corsage on him. <> I am pretty sure I did not date in college in freshman year. I joined the SAL fraternity in my sophomore year. I think there was an annual dance and that I had a date – probably the sister of a frat brother named Broviac. Somewhere in the next two years I dated Gale Ossenbeck at least once. In my senior year, while waiting for my senior picture, I struck up a conversation with the lady sitting next to me, named Mary Helen Rechtin. I remember her as intelligent and pretty. During the conversation I asked her for a date. One of us went in and had our picture taken. As that person returned, MH asked me if I was serious about the date. I don't know if that indicated my credibility or my naivete. We went on a series of dates - mostly movies in downtown Cincinnati followed by dinner at Col. Pompillo's restaurant in Newport. I favored the antipasto. One movie, from Italy, was named Bell'Antonio. I think that when I went to Grad school in Cleveland, I just ignored her. I remember her as my first “serious” relationship. I regret I treated her badly. <> In Cleveland, there was a Newman Club in the middle of campus. Early in the school year, I met a freshman named Geraldine (Gerry) Hall. Her father was a surgeon. We dated all year. She broke with me at the end of the school year in the park with the reflecting pool in front of the Cleveland Art Museum. I cried. I remember her as short and thin with short dark hair. I remember the day JFK was shot, I spent the evening with her. I remember going home (Christmas?) - flying down and taking the train back. She met me at the train station. She remarked she had been in the local train control tower watching the progress of the train. I remember standing with her on the curb on Euclid at the light at Severance Hall. As we were about to step off the curb (we had the green) a car almost hit us. It went on and flipped over at the next intersection. <> That summer there were summer students staying at the graduate house. One was a Mrs Wiand. She was a teacher. She was an Italian Catholic. Her husband was German but not Catholic. They lived in Ashland OH. She introduced me to her daughter Lynne, who was an incoming freshman. I remember Lynne as short and buxom with long blond hair. I remember that, the first time I went to a dorm to see her, I went to one girl's dorm and asked for the other. I remember visiting the Wiands in Ashland at least once. We dated most of the year exclusively. Around the end of the school year, the exclusivity ended. She started dating Joe Gigante, my roommate. By the time the following summer rolled around, we were not dating. <> At some point Bill Owens introduced me to the twin sister of a girl he was dating. Mostly we met on weekends at her parents' beach house on Lake Erie east of Cleveland. <> Dating in Oak Ridge was haphazard. Most memorably I dated a beautiful blond tall nurse in Knoxville I met through the UTK Newman Club. We went to one formal event. There is a picture of us somewhere. I dated someone named Rita with an Italian name in Oak Ridge. I asked her to marry me. She gently said no. I met Sharyn through the summer volleyball games held on the tennis courts in Oak Ridge. When I had my auto accident in 1968, she brought me cookies in the hospital. We became engaged Thanksgiving 1968, told our parents Christmas 1968 and were married 1969Mar8. Our honeymoon was at her uncle Everett''s house in Atlanta. <> When Sharyn left in 1994Aug, I found a Catholic divorced and separated group in Greentree PA run at a parish by a nun. Later I found a very small Catholic divorced and separated group at St Cyril in Brighton Heights. There I met MaryAnn Ranker. She asked me to go to a concert with her. We quickly became close. I went to Altanta Labor Day 1995 after being laid off. She lived in my house w/Teresa for the next year. Summer 1996, Teresa went to Slippery Rock. That may have been the point at which MA joined me in Smyrna. She worked for the Salvation Army regional hq. She returned to PA after a year because of her son. After a year with her son, she came back to Smyrna, again working for SA. She stayed no more than a year. At this point, my memories break up. <> I met Kat online at St Rafael's in late 2001 early 2002. Our first date was Memorial Day 2002. She was living at Clayton State University in a four person apartment.