French 3

When I got to Orange Glen my schedule consisted of the same subjects I had been taking my entire junior year: American History, English, Algebra II, Drafting, French 3 and P.E...

I barely recall attending those classes at Mission Bay High. And my memories from La Jolla High are even hazier - I'm totally blank on Algebra II and French 3 there... In contrast, my recollections from my junior year at Orange Glen are quite clear... I'm really not sure why - I spent roughly the same amount of time (3 months) at each of those schools during the 68/69 school year...

I'll get around to talking about all those classes eventually, but I'm going to start with the one I remember the best - French 3. That's because of Debbie Nielson...

Debbie sat 2 rows to the right and one seat up from me. Fortunately, that was between me and the windows so if she caught me staring I only had to change my focus slightly to have "plausible deniability" :-)

Now - she was way out of my league - I had absolutely no illusions about that. In addition to the obvious reasons, she was a graduating senior and I was a 15 year old junior... Still, I loved everything about her.

Here's her senior picture. It's from a yearbook I found online - it really doesn't do her justice:


She was quite pretty - didn't wear much makeup - didn't need to.

Her wardrobe was classically feminine... Blouses with frills and ruffles and chiffon sleeves - skirts not too long and not too short. Everything subtly sexy - ever so slightly suggestive - but never revealing... Always elegant...

She had long blond hair that she wore in a variety of styles - sometimes braided, sometimes plain. But my favorite was when she pulled back the locks from her temples and tied them together in the back. It fit her perfectly. (To this day I cannot see that hairstyle on a blond woman without smiling...)

But her appearance was not the only reason why I had such a huge crush on her.

A lot of pretty girls suffer from a personality disorder that rhymes with "witch". Debbie was quite the opposite.

Aside: There was a girls who rhymed with "witch" in that French class. She sat behind me... I suppose some guys might have considered her cute - she certainly thought she was. She was kind of pudgy and wore a lot of makeup. She was a bit small on top and a bit large on the bottom with no discernible waist in between. Still - she wore dresses that were way too short and way too tight. Probably compensating for the "attractiveness deficit" with a bit of extra "sluttiness"... I suspect she was from a well-to-do family since she drove a new Mercedes to school - but that's not what made her a "witch":
During class she would sometimes amuse herself by rubbing the back of my leg with her foot, or touching my hair. If I reacted, she and her friends would laugh. And if I didn't react, well - she and her friends would laugh... So yeah - she obviously thought it was funny - I just thought it was not nice...

Another aside: As I've mentioned - I was seriously depressed at the time and my attitude wasn't the only thing that was affected. Some of my fellow students complained that my personal hygiene was also lacking...
Actually - it was more of a clothing odor than a body odor problem (I did shower). Nobody did my laundry regularly and I didn't care enough to do it myself... So every morning I'd just grab something off the floor I hadn't worn recently. (Note that I had given up underwear by then - I didn't even own any...) I suffered from severe allergies and couldn't smell a darn thing so odor was not part of the selection criteria :-) And since I walked almost everywhere my clothes developed a bit of "personality" over time. Yeah - not a pretty picture - but back to the story:

Debbie Nielson didn't seem to care about any of that - she was always genuinely nice to me...

One day a student was being attacked out by the parking lot... I don't know what led up to the incident, but he was in the fetal position against the back wall of the gym while a couple of other guys were yelling obscenities, calling him a "narc" and kicking him. A crowd had gathered - and I have to admit that I was experiencing a certain level of "schadenfreude" - I was just so relieved it wasn't me...
Debbie happened across the scene and was deeply dismayed. I remember her glancing around the crowd trying to figure out why nobody was doing anything. Finally she couldn't take it anymore and jumped in to try and get the attackers to leave the kid alone... It was a risky thing to do - I don't think she even knew the kid who was being attacked... But at that moment she was thinking more about him than herself... Such a rare quality - and one of the reasons I've never forgotten her...

Another time in French class the teacher was working with a small group of senior students (including Debbie) and had them place their desks in a circle. Debbie ended up with her desk directly facing me... And no - this is not another short skirt story :-)

I was having a particularly bad day - I looked and felt like hell... I was supposed to be studying but ended up just staring at my desk with my head in my hands.
At some point I sneaked a glance between my fingers and was stunned to discover that Debbie was staring at me... Quite intently at that... She looked very concerned - I think she sensed I was not OK and was trying to figure out if there was anything she could do to help... Then it was her turn to read and she had absolutely no idea where they were in the book. I felt really bad for inadvertently distracting her :-)
She never did approach me... But just knowing that there were people (like her) who genuinely cared about others helped me get through those rough days...

So yeah - she was a special lady...

My wife sometimes gets a little "weirded out" when I talk about the girls I had crushes on back in the day... She just can't believe how detailed my descriptions are... She once asked if I feel like I "missed out" somehow. Definitely not... It must have been the hormones that caused those memories to be so vivid :-)

I really do regret having paid so much attention to appearance back then... But, in retrospect, there was always more than just good looks to the girls I was attracted to... As a matter of fact, the things that I found most attractive about Debbie Nielson were exactly the same things that attracted me to my wife. Kindness and caring - determination and work ethic - unpretentiousness... They have a lot in common... Except my wife can get ready to go out to dinner in about 5 minutes flat. Yeah - she gets major bonus points for being so incomprehensibly low maintenance... I have not seen her equal :-)

And there's an epilogue:

Near the end of the school year my mom, sis and I went out to dinner at a nearby restaurant on East Valley Parkway. I think it was a Sizzler, but I'm not 100% sure (it's not there anymore). And, as fate would have it, Debbie Nielson was our waitress. (I had no idea she worked there...)
I didn't dare tell mom I had a huge crush on her because of the high probability mom would say something... So I just sat there hoping that (just this once) mom wouldn't cause a scene... Yeah - not a chance:

There's an interesting green iridescence that sometimes appears on sliced deli meats. It involves the lighting, the moisture content and the direction of the cut relative to the muscle fibers. It's perfectly normal and there's absolutely nothing wrong with the meat...
Long story short - mom ordered a roast beef sandwich and noticed a bit of iridescence. Result: A huge scene...
Now - mom's life was one big "drama fest". She caused scenes all the time - it was like she couldn't go out in public without performing :-) And I usually ended up embarrassed... But I can't recall ever being more embarrassed than I was that evening... Mortified would be more like it... Enough said :-)

So that was French 3 at Orange Glen High in the spring of 1969...