Читать книгу Becoming a Counselor - Samuel Gladding T., Samuel T. Gladding - Страница 34

There were several ways to show a girl in my high school that you liked her. Probably the best way was just to tell her. However, for those of us with few social skills, there was an alternative. It was to put a real estate sign in her front yard. If you really liked the girl, a couple of signs were better yet, and the word would get around that you were “signing on” to an interest in her.

One girl I liked went beyond the two signs limit. I am not sure why I thought this young woman was so special, but if I could get back into my 16-year-old brain, I am sure I could figure it out. Whatever the reason, with the help of some friends I gathered five real estate signs and around 11 p.m. put the signs in her front lawn. We had to be as quiet as mice, but we managed.

Smug and satisfied, I started to drive my coconspirators home. Just a block from the scene of our Saturday night adventure, blue lights flashed, and a siren came from the car behind me. It was the City of Decatur police. I was nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs but showed the officer my driver’s license and car registration. He looked suspiciously at my three friends and me. He followed his look with a rather stern voice: “Better get home boys. I have been watching you drive around this neighborhood a lot tonight.” What he did not say was “And I saw you put those real estate signs in a yard.” Minutes later we were all home.

My mother was in the living room reading her Sunday School lesson when I walked in. She just nodded and asked how my evening had been. I said “fine,” careful not to say the word “sign.” I thought to myself “Thank God” I was not caught signing or I would have been in serious trouble—not so much with the police but with my mother.