“I brought some straws,” a helpful voice chimes in.
“What do you do with straws?,” asks another.
“If you suck the beer out of the can with a straw, you will get drunk much faster,” answered the first.
It was a Friday night, and the residents of the first floor of Forest Hall dormitory were on their weekly beer-binging episode. We were newly enrolled students of Southern Oregon College, in Ashland Oregon. This was the fourth week of school, and our third outing. We were in the hills east of Ashland, overlooking the city. Besides the straws, this week we were trying out Colt 45 in 16 ounce cans. The beer in Oregon at the time was limited to 3.2% alcohol. Ashland was only 20 miles from Hilt, California, so Coors was a popular beer in Ashland, because of its higher alcohol content. There was a loop-hole in Oregon’s law, however. Malt liquor wasn’t considered beer by Oregon law, so it was exempt from the 3.2% limit. You could buy Colt 45 and Olde English 800 without having to go to California.
Needless to say, when all of the beer and malt liquor was consumed, we were ready for action! We returned to our dormitory complex and decided to visit one of the girl’s dorms. One of our company said he met a girl in one of his classes who lived in Aspen Hall. Let’s go!
It was a short walk to her dorm. We were pretty noisy along the way, yelling up at girl’s windows and having a good time.
“Angie, Gary Smith is here to see you, and he is here with several of his friends.” The girl at the front desk hoped she conveyed that there were quite a few boys in the lobby!
We were informed that she would be down shortly. After a brief pause, Angie and several of her friends came down the stairs. It seemed like such a good idea to go visit a bunch of girls when we conceived the plan, but in the reality, it seemed a little awkward and forced. I spotted a red-headed girl and built up enough courage to strike up a conversation. I asked her her name, and I found out it was Mary. I then dug in deeper.
“Where are you from?,” I asked.
“Toledo,” she answered.
“Toledo, Ohio?!?” This was interesting. “That is a long way from here! How did you know about Ashland, Oregon and this college, from so far away?”
After a pause, she answered, “Well, my sister went to school here.”
As it will turn out, “Mary” was trying out being called just “Mary,” not “”Mary Lou,” her true name. She also was from Toledo, Oregon, not Ohio. She was getting tired of explaining that Oregon had a Toledo, too, so she just went with Ohio. She didn’t think ahead to what she might now have to know about Toledo, Ohio. She didn’t need to worry; however, as someone suggested we go downstairs to the recreation room.
Most of us went down the stairs. The recreation room was a low-ceiling basement with ping-pong tables in the middle and pinball and vending machines along the sides. I followed the crowd, but once there, I soon realized that the cute red-head hadn’t come downstairs. I soon went back upstairs and wandered through the lobby. I walked out the front door, and Mary was sitting at the top of the stairs. She was a very cute girl with flowing dark red hair. I sat down beside her, and we started to talk again.
Talking with her was so easy! I always got a little tongue-tied when I talked with a girl, especially if I didn’t know her. I normally would start worrying about what we would talk about. This girl was different. I just talked with her without thinking. I learned she just had one older sister. She was a Spanish major. We didn’t have any common classes. She lived in Aspen dorm on the same floor as Angie.
She then turned the focus on me and I answered her questions about me. As the evening wound down, my focus was on remembering her name so that I could connect with her again. I asked her if she wanted to go to the Saturday night dance, the next night. She agreed, and I was to pick her up before the dance so we could walk over together. I remember repeating her name over and over in my mind until I got back to my dorm room and I could write her name down. I was pretty excited.
We continued to go to week-end dances and ate all of our meals together in the dorms. We liked to do the same things and, in a way, I knew deep down that Mary Lou was the one for me right from the start. As I got to know her, I realized how similar we felt on major issues in life. We just seemed right for each other. I felt comfortable with Mary Lou, right from the beginning. She completed me. It is hard to put into words. It wasn’t hard for me to commit myself to her for life.
By the fall of 1969, Mary Lou and I had been together since the fall of 1967. We did everything together, and I couldn’t imagine a life without her. I decided I wanted to marry her and set out plans on how to ask her. I knew her favorite spots on Earth were beaches. I came up with some reason to visit Mary Lou’s parents who live six miles from the ocean. My plan was to go up the Oregon coast and stop along the way at a romantic beach and pop the question. I hadn’t counted on Mary Lou being so fixed on getting home. She resisted wanting to stop at a beach for a walk. She just wanted to get home and see her parents. I finally realized my plan wasn’t going to work.
We finally got to the beach, and we walked south for a ways. When we stopped to turn around, I got down on one knee and asked Mary Lou to marry me. There was a long, long pause. I felt it was eternity. She finally said she couldn’t answer this question before she told me a deep family secret, which might affect my wanting to marry her. I was baffled. What could be so horrible that I wouldn’t want to marry her? She finally told me that her father had Type I Diabetes and it could be hereditary. Whew!!! That was her deep dark secret? A boy who lived across the street when I was younger had Type I Diabetes. He had to take a shot every day. I didn’t think anything of it. I guess Mary Lou was brought up not to discuss family business, and her dad’s diabetes was number one on the list. Anyway, once we got that cleared up, she said “yes,” and we were formally engaged!
Brian
I was 18 years old, it was 1967 and I’d just graduated from high school. In September I left my home, 6 miles from the Oregon coast in Toledo, Oregon, to go to college in Ashland, Oregon. Ashland is in the southern part of the state about 5 hours away from Toledo, I didn’t know anyone in Ashland. I was very shy and it wasn’t easy for me to make friends. My roommate had a boyfriend and was from the Ashland area so she wasn’t around much. I was alone quite a lot.
I was by myself in my room one night in October about a month after school started. I was feeling lonely and all of a sudden I had a realization come over me. It felt like there was an all knowing presence telling me things. It felt like God was talking to me. He told me that I wasn’t going to have close girlfriends but that I was going to have a close boyfriend. The boyfriend would have blond hair and be from California. I was going to have to move far away but eventually I’d be able to come back.
The next night, I was in my dorm room with my door open. A friend of mine, Angie, from my floor had gotten a call on the intercom. A guy she had met in one of her classes had come to visit with a group of his friends. She didn’t want to face all of these boys by herself so she got several of us from the floor to go downstairs with her. There was a wide hallway near the lobby into the dorm. This hallway went between the girl’s dorms and was where the candy vending machines were. There were probably 8 to 10 of us. We all kind of sat around on the floor. I remember Brian sitting next to me and asking where I was from. I said “Toledo”. He said, “Ohio”? I said “yes”. I had gotten tired of that question and thought I’d answer yes for a change, thinking I’d never see this guy again. Then he wanted to know why I’d come so far away from home to go to college. I hadn’t expected to have to answer any questions. I’m not sure what I said, but I remember having a tough time coming up with an answer. The R.A. (resident assistant) came and asked the group to move because we were kind of blocking the hallway. The group decided to go down to the basement, there were ping pong and foosball tables down there. Everyone went down to the basement but I decided to go outside for some fresh air.
I went outside and sat on the side of the steps and watched the night happenings. It wasn’t long before Brian joined me. I was very surprised. He was so easy to talk to. That was very different for me. I hadn’t been around boys very much and I felt like I didn’t know what to say around them. Talking to Brian was very easy, comfortable and natural, after that first lie! He was sitting close to me and I thought maybe he didn’t have enough room so I moved over and he did, too. Oh, I remember thinking I guess he wants to sit this close. We made a date to go to the dance together the next night at the Student Union.
The next night we went to the dance and had a really good time. We agreed to meet the next morning for breakfast ( Sunday donuts) at the dinning hall. From then on we always ate dinner together at the dorms dinning hall, on the weekend we ate every meal together. We went out every week to the dance and/or a movie. It was always so easy to be with Brian and felt so right. Brian had blond hair at the time because he was in the pool swimming all of the time.
Brian asked me to marry him at Agate Beach, Oregon when we were visiting my family. It seemed like such a momentous decision. It was hard for me because I hadn’t had any other boyfriends and I wondered what someone else might be like. I remember thinking that it would be so fun to live and experience life together. I’m sure glad we got married and I made the decision I did. I feel very lucky, I love being married to my best friend.
Mary Lou
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