Cookie

from Betsy Dean Vanasse

I was in the same class as Nick Thorkelson (a year before Bob) and Nick has been forwarding emails about Bob to me.

Except for a couple of parties that my first husband and I gave during college that your mom and dad came to and one high school reunion when Bob was nice to my second husband (to be at that point), my memories of Bob are tied up in my high school memories.

I remember Bob in high school as a great source of positive energy — lots of fun. I have lots of good memories, one of which was Bob dressed up in long johns and a barrel at a Sadie Hawkins dance he went to with his friend Susie Gleason (there’s a picture of that in my high school yearbook, I think) and another which is the prom we went to as friends. (I suspect that Susie had a hand in setting that up.)

I don’t think I’d been to a prom before that so when Bob asked what kind of corsage I wanted I had no idea what a difficult task I assigned him by asking for daisies – but he actually got the florist to make a daisy corsage for me. And I remember lots of laughter and the really bad sunburn I got from falling asleep on the beach the next morning. (I have since “forgiven” everyone there for not rolling me over at some point