My Boyfriend (?) Dennis

When I was 17 at Arcadia High School, I had a crush on a tall, skinny boy named Dennis Lojeski, who was a year older than I was. We both worked for the Arcadia Department of Recreation at the same park after school and during the summer. In addition, Dennis played the bass and sang; he was in a band; and he was an extra in a couple of Elvis movies. That made him cool, despite his thick glasses.

Dennis used to tease me a lot, and I just couldn’t tell whether he liked me. We had to put on a big party for all the city departments. I was in charge of making hamburger patties out of a huge mound of red, slimy, slightly smelly ground beef. There was 50 pounds there, and I had to shape it into 200 patties. When I finally finished, I swore I would become a vegetarian. So I was somewhat irritable when Dennis later teased me some more at the party, enough that I actually threw my glass of soda in his face. Not nice, I know.

We were both counselors at the week long summer camp the Rec Department had in Idyllwild. He brought his guitar and he brought an old one that he let me use, and he taught me to play it. We were told to stay in the cabin at night while our little charges slept, but apparently I was the only one clueless enough to actually do that, so I missed all the late night parties among the counselors.

Dennis never actually asked me out on a date. I got invited along to events that included him. I was friends with the girl singer in his band and went along when the band played at dances, and once we went as a group to the Hollywood Bowl to see Peter, Paul, and Mary, who were the opening act for Sammy Davis, Jr. I asked him to my Senior Prom. He did ask me to his parents house for dinner once, along with other kids. Again, I was too clueless to realize I was being interrogated by his parents and grandparents. He continued to tease me and kid around, so he was fun to be with, but it just felt friendly. He never said he liked me, he never asked me to go steady, and he never even tried to kiss me. In fact, I dated other boys during this time. Since he was class president and very sociable, it did not occur to me that he was shy. However I looked at it, my relationship with Dennis did not seem to be a romance, according to all I’d been led to believe.

Imagine my surprise when one evening he proposed!!! He had completed a year at LA State with plans to become a dentist. I was all set to leave to attend UCLA, where I would finally be FREE, a very exciting prospect indeed. We must have actually had a date, because we came back to my parents’ apartment quite late. He said he had something to ask me, pulled out a ring box, and asked if I would marry him. He started to describe how we would go through college together as fiances, then I’d get a job while he went to dental school, and such. I was utterly shocked!!!

I certainly did not want to get engaged and tied down just when I was about to escape my parents and have adventures at UCLA. (It was the 60s and I did have lots of adventures.) I was too young anyway! I had to interrupt Dennis and tell him that I was too young and did not want to make such a big commitment just as I was starting college. It took him a while to realize he was being turned down, and then he started to cry and suddenly left. 

After he slammed the door, my mother rushed out of a back room, saying, “How could you turn him down like that?” She had been listening in, and I was shocked again to realize that she had been in favor of it! No, I intended to go to UCLA unencumbered. A wise decision, actually. Now that it’s too late to ask Mom, I wonder if Dennis had contacted my parents in advance to “ask for my hand.” I wonder if Dad had also been in favor of it, too. Did they honestly think I was mature enough to make a decision like that?

Anyway, Dennis soon recovered from his broken heart and began dating Janet, who became his wife in a couple of years. Dennis did indeed become a dentist, and he continued to live in Arcadia. He was a city councilman and became mayor of Arcadia for some years. My mother constantly cut out articles about him from the local newspaper and sent them to me. When I saw later photos of Dennis, I was astounded to see that he had gotten fat. He had been so skinny, it was hard to believe he could change that much.

This story has a sad ending. I saw Dennis at a high school reunion that included that classes of 1960 to 1965, and a few weeks later, at the very young age of 53, he died of a brain aneurism while driving his son home from a baseball game. I am sorry for the loss to his family and community, and I am sorry that I never got to know him.