I fell hard for Don in my sophomore year in high school. He was another of those all-around athletic types: blond crew cut, broad shoulders, a big smile, perfect teeth, very friendly, a first-rate student, and (a beauty point with me to this day) bow-legged. One reason I liked him was that he liked me. He was one of the best-liked people in the school, I think, and I'm sure it was for the obvious reason that he was unfailingly nice to everybody.

Louis (I've forgotten why) took only three years of German, but Don was in class with me for the whole four years, and particularly after my estrangement from Lou I was attracted to him even more strongly than I had been earlier. The admiration was entirely from a distance, though it seems to me incredible that he would not have been aware of it.

I saw Don again at our 10th high-school reunion. He had been a very good-looking boy, but in those ten years he became one of the most spectacularly gorgeous men I've ever seen! If the kindness of Fate should ever bring me together with him again, I certainly intend to tell him how I felt about him, all those years ago.

November, 2003
As a matter of fact the kindness of Fate did put us in the same place at the same time, the 50th reunion of our high-school class. We had a very nice chat. He's in good shape and friendly as ever. I didn't say anything about thinking he was a high-school dreamboat.

Another guy I thought was quite fine was Dick, and I did wonder what he thought when I said, "Well, Dick, you were cute then and you still are."