The "I Fantasized About Zoē Until She Appeared!" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Talking with a friend whom I knew from the 1960s.  Worked with Terry at the Acme Supermarket in Lancaster, PA as well as bowled with him in a league at the Rocky Springs Bowling Alley.  The Acme Supermarket is long gone, but the memories of it as well as the bowling alley still exists as if they happened just yesterday.  But, my story is more about another adventure that Terry and I took to the Jersey Shore while in our late teens.  All began when I was in 11th grade at Manheim Township High School in nearby Neffsville, Pennsylvania.  I was told by my 10th grade guidance counselor that I needed to take another language for two more years if I planned to  attend college after high school.  So, I chose French to go along with the two years of Latin I was just about to finish in 10th grade.  My reason was the French teacher who was really good looking.  We all called her Sheena, Queen of the Jungle; tall and blonde!  While in her class she had all of us writing to a pen pal from France.  We could choose a male or female pen pal and send letters written in French to them, hoping we would get a return letter.  I chose a female pen pal whose name was Zoē.  Shenna, aka Miss Nolan, gave us an outline that told what we should write about ourselves.  I wrote a short story telling about myself and where I live.  We had to pick a French name for ourselves, so I chose Raoul.  Wasn't long before I got my first letter from Zoē and began a two year friendship with her via snail mail.  Halfway through my senior year she wrote and told me that she and a friend were going to travel with a youth group to the United States and visit Atlantic City, New Jersey.  By now we are both writing in English, since I wanted to make sure exactly what she was telling me.  She was going to arrive during the summer of 1962, after I had graduated from high school, but she had one more year of schooling in France.  Well, I told Terry all about it and he came up with the idea that I should write and tell her that he and I would like to meet her and a friend.  Wasn't long before the plans were made and we just had to wait for school to end and had graduated.  We exchanged photos through the mail and made plans to meet on the beach near the place where the diving horse performed.  It was to be a day trip for Terry and I and the excitement grew.  Both girls were beautiful, at least according to their black and white photographs.  The day arrived and the weather was bright and sunny.  Terry drove us to Atlantic City and we found a spot on the beach and made ourselves comfortable.  Studied the photograph of the girls and began our search of those walking along the beach.  Wasn't long before we spotted two girls who were headed our way.  Terry said, "That can't be them...they don't look like the girls in the photo!"  It was the girls!  And, they didn't look like the photo!  We sat together and got in the water and attempted to converse in what English they could speak, since after two years of French I still couldn't speak French and Terry had a tough time with English let alone French.  Wasn't long before we knew we needed to escape somehow and find our way back to the car.  I'm not sure how we did it, but the ride home that day was trying to figure out what to tell our friends in Lancaster about how cool our trip was and how beautiful our dates were.  As I look back on it I can imagine what the girls must have told their chaperones that afternoon.  Never heard from Zoē again which was probably the best for both she and I.  And, I haven't spoken a word of French, or Latin, since high school.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.  PS - Still not sure why you had to take two years of two different languages to get into college.  They never once asked me in college if I could speak another language.