Interesting Second Semester

The second semester at Stephens brought about a lot of changes in class schedules for the better.  As a Television, Radio and Film major there were no more watching silent movies and a camera was thrust in my hands to make a twenty minute movie by the end of the semester. The Performance class had taught me how not to make the word dance pronounced with two syllables (Okie talk) and we were turned loose in the radio station. Best of all was no more drawing of sets and learning about cameras, directing and sound boards.  Time to get behind the cameras and do some television shows.

The 1964/65 school year was the opening of the new James Madison Wood Quadrangle.  This series of buildings brought together a variety of group and individual instructional requirements with the maximum use of visual and audio materials.  This was the location of the Helis Communication Center and the Patricia Barry Television Studio. These studios broad casted the College's audio and visual educational programming for the entire campus with state of the art equipment.

For the College to have a fully equipped television station sounds really silly with the technology we have today but back then it was astounding. A little history - in 1965 only 3.1% of all televisions were color sets and FM radio was not popular until the late 1950's.  For the College to have a studio with two color cameras and an FM radio station was cutting edge for that time.  Students produced a weekly television show each week with college news and entertainment plus the radio station was on the air each Saturday.  The "hands-on" experience with only about twenty or thirty girls in the department kept us all busy.

My thought about taking roller skating for physical education did not work out exactly as I had planned.  Did I actually think that bringing my own skates to school with the pink and white fur pom poms attached to the toes would make me look like I had never skated before?  The instructor looked at me the first day of class as I laced up my skates.  
The hard part was trying to stumble around like I had never had skates on before like the rest of the class. 


I was great at listening intently to what the instructor had to say and then doing it.  That only lasted until she taught everyone how to use the toe stops.  Toe Stops!  I had not used toe stops since I was thirteen as they only cause you to crash on your nose.  As everyone else was picking themselves up off of the floor I was gliding to into the good old T-stop. That was a dead give away.  A request by the instructor to stay after class for a discussion led to my confession of skating in two roller skating shows and two Junior Pairs Competitions in junior high school.
Instead of kicking me out of the class we made a deal that I would help her teach the class.  Sounded like a great plan to me.

I don't know if I was suddenly too busy to date much or I was just tired of proving to myself that with out parental supervision I could go out with anyone I wanted to at any time. It just seemed to be more fun to hang out with Cathie and Pam and the rest of the crazy girls I lived with.  Skate boarding in the halls, baking X-Lax cookies and leaving them in the kitchen for others to steal and keeping up with Cathie's silly plans to harass our Dorm Mother was more entertaining than most of the dates I had gone out on.  Besides with seven clubs in Columbia that had bands three or four nights a week and were very open to selling beer to Stephens girls there was no lack of things to do.

What made everyone decide to see what they would look like pregnant?

One Wednesday night in March when we did not have classes the next day either Pam or Cathie and I walked to one of the local clubs called the Den.  I can remember sitting in a booth listening to music and a guy walked over to the booth and said "Hi, my name is Barney. Do you mind if I join you?"  Well, I am not sure which one of us said it was okay as he slid into the booth next to me.  After all what girl in her right mind, even if you have sworn off of dating, would turn away the best looking guy on two feet you have ever seen.

I have no idea what the conversation was that evening after he stated that he had seen me at one of the rather awful Stephens mixers a few weeks before.  Stephens in a lot of ways was still clinging to the old "Finishing school" days where they thought young ladies needed assistance in meeting boys. There was punch and cookies plus music that was difficult to dance to by the standards of the day.  Usually a quick look around sent me back to the dorm.  It was almost like a junior high sock hop where the boys stood on one side of the room and the girls on the other. Counting my socks in my room sounded like more fun.  

It is rather difficult to mumble anything of an intelligent nature as your mind is racing trying to figure out how this guy remembers you in a sea of twenty thousand college students.  I did remember that he didn't go into any sports talk or Frat boy stuff which would have made me want him to go away. Did he ask for a phone number?  Did he say he would call?  Did he give us a ride back to the dorm to make the 10:00 curfew?All I could remember was how soft spoken and polite he was.  How he had a lock of hair that fell across his face when he laughed.  How small and stupid I felt trying to make a good impression while my heart was pounding.

There are those times when minutes seem like hours.  It was a lucky thing that I was incredibly busy the next few days or the minutes would have seemed like years.  No matter how hard you try to convince yourself that someone named Barney is not going to call you it is hard not to hope. Saturday morning I dragged myself to class and even made a note on my calendar to stop thinking about him.  Arriving back at the dorm I found flowers.  Flowers! Who sends flowers? And who sends a note a note that said "Had to go home for the weekend.  I'll pick you up at 3:00 on Sunday." Signed by the magical name - Barney.