Each spring I am reminded of a long, cold winter many years ago. It was my first winter living up north, in Pennsylvania. I had rented the top two floors of a 200 year old hotel. I got them cheap and shared them with a five and a half foot tall, somewhat shady, chef. Just a few days after I moved in, I met one of my neighbors. He was eager to meet me, to ask me a burning question. “Had I seen her yet?”
“Who?”, I asked, thinking perhaps a date might be in the offing.
“The ghost”, came the reply. My new friend proceeded to tell me the story of how my newly rented residence had been a house of ill repute and a speak easy during the years of Prohibition. It seems that one of the ‘employees’ at said establishment had become somewhat disenchanted with her situation and hanged herself in one of the rooms. Which room? My room. The marks from the cord she used to hang herself were said to still be visible on the open rafters in the ceiling.
Let it suffice to say this altered my perception of the value of this place immeasurably.
In an effort to turn lemons into lemonade, I decided that the question as to whether or not the ghost was real or not was not something I had to resolve. Practical prudence dictated that I operate on the assumption that the ghost was real and go about making friends with her. Friends don’t scare the shit out of friends.
First, I gave her a name. Her name was ‘Molly’. Secondly, I always said ‘Good Morning, Molly’ to her when I woke up, ‘Good By, Molly’ to her when I left for work, and ‘Molly, I’m home’ when I got home after work. If I brought someone over to my new home, I introduced them to Molly. Some folks thought I might be a little crazy, because I did, after all live in a haunted house and insist on introducing them to my ghost. After several weeks of this with no unpleasant encounters with apparitions of any sort, I thought that if there was indeed a ghost, I had succeeded in making friends with her. Life, I thought, is good.
Moving to Allentown was a challenging thing. I didn’t know a soul there. I was there working as a consultant to Air Products and Chemicals. I was lonely for female companionship. I couldn’t date anyone I met at APCI because of the whole ‘never date someone at work’ thing. I happen to think that is still a good practice. I was, however, stuck. I didn’t know anyone except Paul and Rosie.
Paul and Rosie were a couple who I had met at a place called The Starlight Diner in Trexlertown, Pa. Trexlertown is a ‘suburb’ of Allentown. Paul had a speaking cadence similar to Emo Phillips, and Rosie was a DBA at Bethlehem Steel. Several times a week, I would see them at The Starlight and converse with them over drinks. I explained my predicament to them, and Paul suggested that Rosie introduce me to her boss at Bethlehem Steel. It took several conversations, and a promise on my part not to get her fired to secure Rosie’s promise to set up a date with her boss. A blind date.
The day of the date finally arrived. It was Friday, April 17. It was Good Friday. We all were to meet at 6:00 at a bar near the Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton Airport called ‘The Jet Port’. I was the first to arrive. I am always first. It’s a compulsion. I selected a nice table for four away from the DJ booth. All the tables were decorated with colorful, helium filled balloons. Rosie and Paul arrived just a couple of minutes past 6:00. We ordered cocktails. Rosie wanted to make absolutely sure I understood that I could not do anything so crazy as to get her fired. Under no circumstances was I to go ‘off the reservation’. We ordered two or three more rounds of drinks. Six thirty came, and I was starting to think I had been stood up, when I got an idea.
I grabbed one of the helium balloons, took a deep breath of helium, looked at Rosie and said “Follow the Yellow Brick Road!” Paul and I thought this was hilarious. Rosie smiled and looked away. I took a huge deep breath of helium, spotted a pretty, blue eyed young lady who happened to be walking near our table. I went over to her and in my helium pitched voice said, “Gaily bedight, a gallant knight, In sunshine and in shadow. Had journeyed long, singing a song, in search of Eldorado”.
I took another deep breath of helium, and noticed this girl could open her eyes really widely and she had the prettiest strawberry blond hair. I squeaked “Shadow said he, where can it be, this land called Eldorado”. A third deep breath, and I finished “Over the mountains of the moon, and down into the valley of the shadow. Ride, boldly ride, the shadow replied if you search for Eldorado.”
I exhausted the very last of my breath voicing the last of the poem. Somewhat dizzy from hypoxia but very proud of myself, I smiled at the somewhat horrified young lady whom I had so rudely accosted. I looked over at Paul and Rosie. Paul was laughing so hard he was turning blue, but Rosie had her face in her hands.
That was thirty years ago this year come April 17th. The pretty blond was not so traumatized that she didn’t have a really good time that night. By the time the night was over, we had the whole bar inhaling helium and screaming ‘Follow the Yellow Brick Road!” We may have been asked to leave. I called her a few days later to ask her out again. She agreed, but on one condition. I had to get a haircut. I had been living in Allentown for about five months. So, it had been about 7 months since I had a haircut. I was a computer programmer, and in those days, if you were a programmer, it sometimes paid to have folks think you were a little crazy. The hair added to that effect. I got a haircut.
Two years and 13 days later, we were married.
Before you ask, Molly was not happy about any of this. She behaved very poorly when Landi was introduced. She was, in fact, so displeased that I wound up having to get another apartment. Note to self, never piss off a ghost. That story is a blog entry for another day. This blog entry is, as my wife says, about “a blind date gone bad.”
Happy anniversary, baby, I’ve got you on my mind.
Great story Bill. I recall Landi, but had no idea of the fun details. Dan