She was less than half my age and about half my size, so people who were used to thinking in cliches, as most of us are, thought of us in cliches. Old guy taking advantage of sweet young thing. (Or Tall guy taking advantage of short young thing.)

That was what her mother seemed to think. She hated me and thought I was taking advantage of that sweet young thing. Maybe her whole family hated me.

Even so, she seemed like an angel.

Maria came east with me at spring break in 1990, along with Joel and his friend Ceasura. We came east to scatter my mother's ashes in Jackie's back yard. Joel and Ceasura and Maria and I all shared a room in the Silver Spring Econolodge -- what an embarrassment! Here is Maria in the morning, drying her hair.

And here are the two of us at Jackie's place later in the day. Doesn't seem to me I could be that much taller than her. Maybe she's a step down on the basement stairs.       And those blue wavery lines -- don't worry about them. This is not the Blair Witch Project. Just a malfunctioning scanner.       (Oooo -- but what if it's not just a malfunctioning scanner?...)

This photo is precisely five months later -- August 18. Maria and I went out to the place Wayne and Karen had just moved to and ate a watermelon with them. (Want to see the two of them across the table from us?)       Not long before Maria left Iowa City for New York. Just weeks before Wayne got the Stegner fellowship that took him and Karen out to Stanford for a couple of years.

The last time I saw Maria was in the fall of 1996. She flew from Atlanta to visit me in Winchester, Virginia.

She was moody and slept thirteen hours a night and left a couple of days earlier than she'd meant to. She said she'd discovered that I was a cold person.

When I told Joel that, he scoffed and said "You, dad?"

Of course I wouldn't seem cold to Joel. To Joel I must seem like a bowl of emotional oatmeal.

Not cold oatmeal, I hope.

This is a homemade card Maria sent me in 1994. I was involved with Lois by then and living at Jacky Lewis's house in Rio del Mar, but I thought Maria and I would remain friends forever.       I've lost touch with her, but I presume she's still in Atlanta and hope she's very happy.

[Nota bene: This page, like all the others in this site, is in progress. Please let me know if you find anything false, misleading, offensive, or intrusive to your privacy. Let me know too if there's a photo or something in the text that should be removed or something that should be added. I have not set up this site primarily for my own sake but for my family and friends -- and I welcome all corrections, additions, and suggestions about how to improve it!]

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Copyright © 1999 T. N. R. Rogers. All rights reserved. Last revised 15 aug 99.