221104 Betty

Betty was an interesting young girl.

This story goes a long way back. I was just a lad, perhaps 9 or 10 and I was infatuated with Betty Tate. The neighborhood was filled with girls, but I was devoted to Betty because she was, I thought, wonderful and she was all of 14 or something like that and not the least interested in me. That was of little consequence for me and I would do anything for her. As I said, the neighborhood was so filled with girls that in order to get a softball game going in the schoolyard across the street we had to enlist the girls.

That is the back-story and now the rest of the story begins. One sunny, beautiful afternoon there was a congress large enough to get a game going. I was always a terrible team player and rarely picked until the last pick on the last team. I was always afraid of getting hit by a baseball or a softball. On the day in question I was playing catcher, in a slow pitch softball game, when Betty came up to bat. Now as anyone knows, a batter always steps into the ball when trying to hit. Well anyone but my lovely Betty knew that. I was behind home plate when the first pitch came in and Betty stepped back at the plate and also pulled the bat back with tremendous power, clacking me right in the forehead. Lucky for me Officer Hildebrand was making his afternoon rounds of the playground and school. The kids all reeled back in horror when my forehead split wide open with blood squirting all over, but Officer Hildebrand rushed to my assistance pulling his handkerchief from his pocket and pressing it to my forehead. He walked me home and stayed until my mother could get transportation for me to the doctor’s office. I was ever more afraid of baseball and softball after that, but my boyish desire for Betty still lingered. She may have even kissed my forehead after the stitches. I’m thinking of her over 67 years later when I look in the mirror and see my scar from the girl that I once wanted.

The Tate’s left later that year. I still remember their time there when there was no air conditioning. Her mom and Betty would roam around the house in the heat of summer wearing nothing but bras and panties. They were of course the talk of the neighborhood, but I never minded, I rather enjoyed the view. The son, aptly named Sonny, had a motor scooter he rode around on and I thought that was pretty cool too. Once they left the rented house they lived in, the house was never rented again. It was eventually torn down. One strange thing about the house was it had an attached garage, but no driveway. The old house must have been put in before indoor plumbing because when a toilet was added it was put in the open garage, on a bare dirt floor. The toilet was like none other I had seen. There was no flush handle on the tank. The flush was triggered after one sat down or pushed down on the seat and then let the seat come back up. The alley behind the house’s garage had a double Duch door. After they left I found out the top of the door was never locked as the bottom had been. That allowed me access from the back side of our fence. I could just swing from the fence into the garage. The Tate’s left all kinds of interesting things for a young boy to look through. That I will leave up to your imagination.