History lesson, part the second, or The One That Got Away.

(Is it still nostalgia if you'd sorta rather forget it happened? I suppose so. Come with me while I eviscerate myself for your pleasure.)

Not too long before I left for Marist, I became good friends with one of the girls at the Stop and Shop I worked at. D.J. was a senior at West Haven High at the same time that I was a senior at N.D., and we would often ride the same bus from school to work. After initially not liking each other because of the whole N.D./West Haven thing(ah, high school rivalry), we gradually became buddies. I didn't really think anything of it at the time, because I was trying to work out my relationship with K.M. and she was in a relationship with some guy... with a mullet and a Camaro. (I know, shocking.)

Anyway, after we graduated from our respective high schools, D.J. suddenly announced to me that she was moving out to Utah to live with her older sister. She'd had a troubled childhood, and moved around a lot, so the move shouldn't have come as a surprise, but I was still a bit shocked. I gave her my address, and didn't really think much of it, as my relationship with K.M. pretty much torched itself in front of my eyes. So it came as a surprise when I came home one afternoon early in August to find a pink envelope in the mailbox. Over the next few weeks, I received a few more letters, 1 page gradually becoming 4. She told me of plans, of things that she thought would get better. I told her about things that happened in the store, about the destruction of my relationship with K.M., and how much I was looking forward to Marist.

Then the letters stopped.

I didn't initially think anything of it. I was busy with classes, getting so drunk at a party the third night there that I passed out(this is the next tale of Muggleton romantic woe, by the way), trying to get onto the Marist radio station, hanging out with my new best friend. Plus, it wasn't like I was emotionally invested in the situation. Was I?

On the last Saturday in September, LDub and I took a school-sponsored bus trip to New York City. Theoretically, we were supposed to be going to the Met and then to South Street Seaport, but as long as we got to our bus at the end of the day, we could do what we wanted. So LDub and I headed down to Greenwich Village for the day. When we got back to Marist, about 10 that night, there was a note on my door. It said "Call D.J. collect when you get in, whatever time."

I walked down the hall to the payphone room and spent the next two and a half hours on the phone with D.J. By the end of the conversation, my head was spinning over the fact that I'd spent all that time on the phone with her, and better, that she was coming back to Connecticut and would be home by the time I came home for Thanksgiving break. I floated back to my dorm room. The next month and a half dragged by, and by the time I left for break, it was clear that I was in pretty far over my head at school.

It didn't help that I had a great group of friends to hang out with, a group of friends that were as completely and utterly geeky as I was. It didn't help that I had nobody standing over me going, "Hey schmuck, study." It especially didn't help that I was spending most of my idle time daydreaming about seeing D.J. when I got home. As a result, I headed home under the weight of the fact that I was most likely failing one class, and probably failing at least one other.

Once home, I decided to forget about the problems waiting for me in Poughkeepsie, and to move forward instead. I set up a Friday night date for us, then went and got myself cleaned up. (Three months away from home and from my barber hadn't been kind to the 'do.) That Friday, I got myself dressed up, stopped at the florist and got some flowers, and then headed over to where D.J. was staying. She came out, and my heart skipped a beat.

Sixteen years later, it's tough to remember exactly where we went for our date. I know we went to see "Harlem Nights", but I don't remember where we ate. But I do remember exactly what she was wearing(blue jeans and a nice pink sweater), how she smelled(like strawberries), and the way she held my hand lightly while we walked into the movie theater. (This is my Bernstein* moment, I think, for the rest of my life. Sixteen years have gone by, and I don't think more then a day or two have gone by where I haven't thought of D.J. or that wonderful night.)

At the end of the evening, we talked about things, and she asked if she could come to Poughkeepsie and see me. We agreed that she would come up the following weekend(which just happened to be my birthday) and then parted company. Despite angling for it, I didn't get a goodnight kiss, which should have been a signal to me. But I was too busy thinking about her coming to Po-town. I went back to school that Sunday, and eagerly awaited the following Friday, when she would make her way to me.

On Friday afternoon, I shanghaied a classmate, J.W., to take the train down to N.Y.C, where we would meet D.J.'s train and ride back to Po-town with us. Unfortunately, D.J. hadn't made the train she was supposed to be on, so J.W. and I had to cool our heels in Grand Central for an hour waiting. Finally, she arrived, and we rode the train back to school. If memory serves, LDub and I took D.J. up to the diner for a late night snack, then for a walk down to the river(short, since it was December), and then we went back and signed her into LDub's room. (Marist had a strict(hah) policy about boys and girls sleeping on separate floors.) D.J. and I stayed up very late talking and having a good time.

Saturday was December 2, which was my birthday as well as J.W.'s. Some of our friends had booked a birthday party for J.W. and I at Grand Slam U.S.A., and I felt bad about leaving D.J. at the dorms, but she insisted I go and have a good time. So we went, and sure enough, we had a good time. Imagine a bunch of 18 year olds acting like little kids in an indoor batting and golf range, and that's about what it was.

That night though, things got heavy. D.J. basically laid out her whole life's story to me, which was full of abuse and problems and all sorts of stuff, but when I tried to comfort her, she got distant and didn't want to talk about it anymore. All at once, it seemed as though everything had come crashing down. Here I was thinking I'd be able to get something going with D.J., and maybe I'd gotten too close too quickly, passing from potential mate to confidante. The next day we didn't talk a lot. I rode the train down to the city with her, kissed her on the cheek and gave her a hug as I put her on the train back to New Haven, then rode the train back to Po-town in a funk. (A funk which pretty much killed what little interest I had in school, by the way.)

I got a few more letters from her before Christmas break, but the spark was gone. Without even realizing it, I'd fried any chance I might have had with her. We saw each other when I got home, but things had changed for good, and we both knew it. Except for a brief period when I got home from school for good in the summer, I never heard from her again.

So what's the lesson here? Well, I learned that sometimes a good thing is a good thing, and sometimes it's too good to be true. I also learned that long-distance relationships suck. Most importantly, I learned to define the terms of the relationship a lot better before getting all kinds of whacko ideas. But as I said, there haven't been many days in the last sixteen years that I haven't thought of her and wondered where she is, and wondered what if? Unhealthy? Probably, but everyone out there has a one that got away.

Next: My great tale of drunken debauchery (one whole night of it...)

(*the Bernstein moment refers to a bit of dialogue in Citizen Kane in which Everett Sloane relates a story about a girl on a ferry and how he still remembered her forty years later.)