From Bowling Green to New York by Bus (Cont.)
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Time certainly did not lie heavily on either of us. The minutes, hours, and miles raced by. Soon we were at higher altitudes which brought on a noticeable change in the weather. As the much cooler mountain air of West Virginia settled on us later that evening, Caroline (I had not yet come to calling her Carol) suggested we make use of some blankets she had seen earlier in the overhead rack. I agreed but when I looked, I could find only one blanket not already in use. Of course I offered it to her, but in response she asked if it wasn't big enough for us both. It didn't take long to find that it was -- that is, if we sat very close together. Snug and warm under that blanket, now drawn tight around us, we talked for hours into the night until we finally fell asleep.

Somewhere between Wheeling and Washington, we made a breakfast stop. Stiff and still somewhat groggy, Caroline and I got off the bus and along with some other passengers went into the roadside restaurant, where we first drank some excellent coffee. I remember it was steaming hot and very good. And only 5~ a cup! I have forgotten what else we ordered, but our now incessant conversation continued while we ate.

Our next regular stop was in Washington. It was my first visit to the capital. Caroline had been there several years before with her father and was therefore able to point out and tell me something about several of the famous sights. From just outside the bus station, we could see the Washington Monument, the Capitol, and the White House, but our schedule prevented us from going to any of these places.

From Washington, our journey continued overnight through Maryland, Delaware, and on to Philadelphia, where we arrived early the next morning. The bus terminal there was larger and more attractive than others we had seen, and so we did not mind the two-hour wait before catching the bus for New York.

It was in the Philadelphia waiting room that our conversation took a sudden turn, when Caroline asked me where I was going to stay in New York. Somewhat surprised by this question -- or at least by what I thought might be its implications, I simply said I did not know. Whereupon, she then asked me rather matter-of-factly if I would like to stay with her in her Greenwich Village apartment until I found a place.

Before I recovered from the shock of such a question -- the reader should be reminded it was the year 1933 -- she added that her father had already secured for her a small furnished apartment near Washington Square, not far, she said, from where he was living with the woman he expected to marry that summer.

My answer was slow in coming -- so slow that she seemed to be embarrassed that she had proposed such a thing. I regretted this, but here I was, a naive, unsophisticated young man from rural Kentucky trying desperately to think of a suitable response to what was obviously a sincere invitation, but which to me was also an avant-garde proposition, to say the least. After an awkward silence, I thanked her and said we could talk about it later.

All the time we were having this face-to-face discussion in that Philadelphia waiting room, I became increasingly aware of how beautiful Caroline really was. Naturally curly blonde hair framed her delicate complexion and classic facial features in soft lines. The sharp but also warm and pleasant gaze from her clear, blue eyes bespoke a high intelligence I came to appreciate more and more later in New York. And the graceful way she carried her erect body brought dignity and self assurance to her beauty. She was indeed a most unusual girl, I concluded. As I watched her sitting on that not too comfortable waiting room bench, I marveled at how attractive she was, in spite of the wrinkled clothes she had slept in for the past two nights.

After browsing around in the Philadelphia terminal a little longer and agreeing that most of what we saw for sale was "tourist junk," we boarded a bigger and much shinier bus -- one carrying in bold letters above the windshield the name of its destination, "New York." Just reading those magic words made my heart beat faster. Here we were about to begin the last leg of our journey, Caroline's and mine; and as I thought about it I was both happy and sad. Happy that very soon I would actually be in that world-famous city of opportunity, but at the same time, sad that my cherished time with Caroline would be at an end in just a few hours.

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