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Mary Pagels and I saw each other
in
passing during our
first quarter (Fall 1954) at Stanford, but it wasn't until the
beginning of Winter quarter in January,
1955 that our relationship began. We were in a long line at
the Stanford Bookstore (P comes shortly after L, so she was close
behind me)
waiting to pay for stacks of books we'd collected for the
quarter. I
recognized Mary Pagels as someone I'd met from the dorm next door so we
chatted
to kill time while waiting. Much to my chagrin, when it
came time for me to pay I discovered I'd forgotten to bring my
checkbook
(forgot: sound familiar?). With little hesitation, Mary offered
to pay for
my books, and I thankfully accepted and promised to repay her as soon
as I had
my checkbook. Years later she told me that when she got back to
her dorm
she began to think she may never see that money again, since at that
point I was
essentially a stranger to her.
In reality, of course, I had no
intension of
stiffing Mary for the money. In fact, that evening after I got
back to my
dorm and had dinner in the Stanford Village cafeteria, I called Mary on
the Terman
Hall phone (we had one phone hanging on the wall outside the sitting
room for
the entire first floor). I asked her if she would go out for a
drink with me at The Cellar, on
El Camino in Menlo Park, where I could thank her for her kindness and
give her a
check for the books. And so began our friendship and many more
calls to
Mary from that Terman Hall phone.
Part of our getting to know each
other
was during the many joint outings
of the Terman Hall (men's) and Sterling Hall (women's) graduate
students. One
of these was a ski trip to Dodge Ridge not long after our bookstore
meeting and
date at The Cellar.
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