“I’m in Richard’s Constitutional Law class right now,” Bill said. “He’s fantastic.”
“I’m having dinner at their house tonight,” I said. “What are your plans for after Yale?”
“I’ll go back to Arkansas and run for either Congress or attorney general.” Bill wasn’t the first person at Yale I’d heard express this kind of goal, but he expressed it with the greatest certainty.
I said, “I was president of the student government at Wellesley, but I think that may have been it for me—that my involvement with campaigns from here on out won’t be as the candidate.”
“Why?”
“Well, there’s being female, for one thing. Also, I take it you don’t mind asking people for money.”
“No doubt about it, money-grubbing is part of the game. But I’m pretty shameless.”
I laughed.
“I did student government in high school and the first couple years of college,” he said. “But I went to Georgetown, and the longer I was in Washington, the more time I spent on Capitol Hill instead of campus. It was hard to resist the lure of the real thing. I was a staffer for Fulbright, and if the choice was attending a Foreign Relations Committee meeting versus listening to twenty-year-olds complain about the food in the dining hall, it wasn’t much of a contest.”
“Being a member of Congress and being attorney general of Arkansas seem really different,” I said. “Don’t they? Geographically and also, you know, metaphysically speaking?”
This time, he laughed. “I’ll see what makes the most sense once I’m home,” he said. “Frankly, I’m prepared to serve in just about any capacity that improves the lives of the people of Arkansas.”
“You certainly sound like a politician.”
We were turning onto Chapel Street, and he seemed unbothered as he said, “You mean I sound like a phony?”
“Maybe rehearsed more than phony.”
“Is there a difference?”
“Sure,” I said.
“There’s a real piece-of-shit GOP congressman, a Nixon crony, up in the third district, which is mostly rural besides Fayetteville. This man is nice enough if you’re talking to him, but when he’s in Washington, he forgets all about his constituents. Unseating him would be a long shot, but you’ve got to start somewhere.”
We had reached the front of the gallery, which was in another Gothic building, this one particularly castle-like. I stopped walking, causing Bill to stop, too. I looked up at his face and said, “Why are we here? I don’t mean at the gallery. I mean, why are we spending time together? What do you want?”
He smiled. “What do you think I want?”
“No,” I said. “Give me a real answer. There’s been enough of this”—I searched for the correct words, then landed on a phrase I’d never used before—“this chitty chat.”
His expression grew concerned, and when he spoke, his tone was serious. He said, “We’re on a date. I wanted to go on a date with you.”
For a few seconds, I stared at him. “Why?”
He still seemed worried, fearful of misstepping, and matter-of-fact rather than fawning, as he said, “Because you’re the smartest person at Yale.”
I didn’t know how to reply, so I laughed. It came out as more of a cackle than I’d intended.
“You must know that’s what people say,” Bill said. “I knew who you were more than a year ago. My mom clipped the article about you out of Life magazine and sent it to me at Oxford.”
“And that’s your thing? Smart women?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“If you’re planning on a career in politics, I’d assume you want more of a doting housewife.”
“Well, I’m not proposing marriage,” he said, and I felt a surge of embarrassment. Then he smiled again and added, “Yet.” I suppose this was my first experience of Bill’s overlapping flirtatiousness and kindness. He said, “Listen. I’m just happy to be spending time with you right now. I had a hunch you were really cool, and you are.” He paused for a half second and, not entirely unselfconsciously, added, “And also really attractive.” He tilted his head toward the entrance to the gallery. “Wasn’t I about to show you some Arkansas magic?”
* * *
—
In 1957, my friend Maureen Gurski’s tenth birthday party took place at her house in Park Ridge, a block away from where my family lived. Six girls sat at the Gurskis’ dining room table eating cake, along with Maureen’s younger brother and parents. The subject of baseball came up—I was an ardent Cubs fan, despite their terrible record that year—and I said, “Even if the White Sox are having a better season, Ernie Banks is clearly the best player on either team. If the Cubs build around him, they’ll be good in time.”
Maureen’s father smiled unpleasantly from across the table. He said, “You’re awfully opinionated for a girl.”
It was not the first time someone had said such a thing. Starting when I was in third grade, my teacher, Mrs. Jauss, had routinely asked me to be in charge when she left the room, a task that sometimes necessitated my telling John Rasch to sit down or stop poking Donna Zinser and resulted in John reminding me that I wasn’t a teacher. In fourth grade, I’d been elected co-captain of the safety patrol, which occasionally elicited similar resistance from my peers. But Mr. Gurski’s remark was the sentiment’s clearest and most succinct expression in my life thus far and gave me, henceforth, a kind of shorthand understanding of the irritation and resentment I provoked in others. Not all others, of course—plenty of people admired that I was eager and responsible—but among those provoked were both men and women, adults and children.
Is it odd that I feel a certain gratitude to Bud Gurski? It’s for (yes) two reasons. First: He said what he said at just the right moment. I was still in possession of the brazen confidence of a nine-year-old girl and didn’t take him seriously, the way I might have if I were twelve or thirteen. Second: He used less ugly terms than he could have, far less ugly than I’ve encountered in the years since. Opinionated for a girl? Of course I was opinionated! And indeed I was a girl. He was stating facts more than offering insult.
Mr. Gurski was about thirty-five at the time of Maureen’s tenth birthday, which seemed to me rather old for putting a grade school girl in her place. I hadn’t yet learned this is an impulse some men never outgrow. But he was easy to dismiss, even though I was aware that to convey my dismissal wouldn’t have been respectful. You’re awfully dumb for a grown-up, I thought. Aloud, I said, “Well, Ernie Banks is a great ballplayer.”