Animal House wannabes
I hadn’t seen Animal House until this past week. I recorded it, and as I watched, light bulbs flickered on above my head.
I finally got it.
My first boyfriend in college had been trying to emulate Eric Stratton.
We met at Freshman Orientation. I don’t recall the exact circumstances, but for those two days he pursued me.
I regarded him warily. Not only did I have a boyfriend at home, but I also didn’t trust this guy. He seemed like a pretty slick character, full of smooth talk and rehearsed lines. But it was entertaining to watch him flirt with me – not many guys did – and I have to admit that I enjoyed the attention.
During orientation, he and some of the other Freshman Engineering students heard about a fraternity that was recolonizing after having been kicked off campus. Again, I’ve forgotten the details of the events that led to the disciplinary actions, but he met with some of the fraternity brothers and decided he wanted to be part of the recolonization effort when he came back that fall.
When school started, we found each other immediately and fell right into being a couple. I had ended things amicably with my boyfriend at home – carrying on a long-distance relationship made no sense – and I was pleased that this guy seemed just as interested now as he had during orientation.
For the first month, everything was fine. We formed a common group of friends, including the fraternity pledges, and I felt like quite a big shot, hanging out at an off-campus fraternity house.
He recruited other pledges, introducing himself as “Dick Burly*, damn glad to meet ya.” I thought it was kind of a cheesy line, but I didn’t realize he’d cribbed it.
He nicknamed one of the other pledges “Trout”.
He dressed in a toga for parties on more than one occasion.
As far as I know, he never screwed the dean’s wife. But his attention did start to wander to another engineering student whom the guys had nicknamed “Bubbles”. She was no Mandy Pepperidge, but she did have long blonde hair and legs up to HERE.
I was oblivious until his older brother came to visit one weekend. Big Brother didn’t mind saying – in front of me – that Dick shouldn’t tie himself down to one girl. In retrospect, Big Brother was giving good advice to both Dick and me, but at the time, I remember thinking that if only Big Brother hadn’t come to town, everything would have been just fine.
I got my final Animal House-inspired wake-up call a couple months later – after Dick had officially moved on to Bubbles (whom I had befriended in a wildly successful attempt to annoy the shit out of him), and I was doing laundry one evening with another engineering student. He brought up Dick and Bubbles – in particular, how Dick sponged off Bubbles when it came to homework assignments – and I mentioned my previous relationship with Dick.
He said, “You and he were together? At the beginning of the year?”
Yes. Why do you ask?
He hesitated, then told me that Dick had mentioned me before. Not by name, but just as “this girl I’m seeing. She actually TRUSTS me.”
I felt sick, physically sick. I knew he’d moved on, which never feels good, but I didn’t think he’d been insincere all along. Even now, it still causes a twinge inside to think that Dick had bragged about putting one over on me.
So when I watched Animal House and heard Eric Stratton callously tell Flounder, “You fucked up. You trusted us,” it hit me hard. Right in the gut, like a sucker punch. I wasn’t expecting it that night in the laundry room, and even after seeing all the other Dick Burly/Eric Stratton parallels throughout the movie, I still wasn’t expecting it. That line hit way too close to home.
I have no idea what’s become of Dick, and I haven’t thought about him in many years. It was only when I watched this movie that some long-forgotten, mostly unpleasant memories were stirred.
Dick, if you have a little girl, I hope she never meets a guy like you.
*Dick Burly is obviously a pseudonym – a most ironic one. The joke dates back to Freshman Orientation.
August 26th, 2006 at 8:37 am
You painted the picture of Dick to a T. I know just the kind of guy you’re talking about…I had the unfortunate experience of accidentally (read: I was drunk) getting semi-involved with a guy like that in college and it was difficult to get out of once I woke up and realized what a jerk he was.
August 26th, 2006 at 9:53 am
Mine was named Mark (real name, fuck him). Total Eddie Haskell, I was crushed when I realized that I had been duped – not so much because I was duped, but because it was notorious in his frat house that I was being duped. He’s a lawyer now, I’m shocked.
August 26th, 2006 at 10:05 am
Ugh, that’s icky. Don’t you just hate those memories, that bring up those awful feelings? You’d think they’d go away permanantly, but just when you haven’t thought about it for years, something trips them. Loved the pseudonym too.
August 26th, 2006 at 11:19 am
I think all guys wanted to be Eric Stratton, but most only ended up being Bluto Blutarsky.
August 26th, 2006 at 11:45 am
Let’s hope Dick didn’t become a gynecologist….eww. I think many of us have a guy in our past like that…
August 26th, 2006 at 11:47 am
Seems like there are Dick Burly clones on every campus. Unfortunately, they don’t just graduate, because another one comes along to to take his place. It’s like there’s a smarmy a-hole virus that just won’t die.
August 26th, 2006 at 11:52 am
How sad is it that this 18/19 year old guy was so insecure that he took on the personality of a movie character?! You know you’re better off, but still a definite punch to the gut!
August 26th, 2006 at 12:25 pm
Mine was Tim (I’m with IAI…real name, fuck him!)
I was happy (in an evil, cathartic kind of way) to hear that a few years after my falling for his ridiculousness…he fell for a woman…who left him licking his wounds for years to come.
But I have once or twice thought about him and wondered…does he have a daughter? Does having a daughter make him sorry for having been such an ass in college? Hmmmm.
August 26th, 2006 at 1:04 pm
Mine was a Mark too, real name fuck him!. I know the dirty tricks he played at our Christian college, how many master keys he made to ALL the locked building on campus so he could break in ” legit”. Who he sold pot to and the parties he hosted. I grew out of that stupid after a while and he became a minister….talk about HOLY SHIT! He actually called me one time a few years ago to ask if he was the reason that I left church..yep I told him, I poured as much guilt into his wounds as I could muster. He has 3 daughters and a son…poor things!
August 26th, 2006 at 6:31 pm
I’m most impressed that you ended your post on such a classy note!
August 26th, 2006 at 6:42 pm
Thankfully I never had a guy quite like that. But you wrote this so well that I felt all your frustration. Well done.
August 26th, 2006 at 8:10 pm
Wow, heavy stuff. I think we all have to endure those kinds of guys in our lives just to make sure we end up with the right ones, no? And don’t you wonder whether he’s come around? Whether he now looks back on those days with remorse and regret?
My own memories of Animal House are so different – I was 10, it was my first R-rated movie, and I remember the girl on the football field who said “I lied too. I’m only 13″ confused me – after all, what was the problem? 13 was old! It was a TEENager!
August 26th, 2006 at 9:28 pm
You told story this SO WELL. I just wanna wind back the clock and go kick some Dick Burly ass for you!
August 27th, 2006 at 7:41 am
I dated a guy in college who was an arrogant ass, not to put too fine a point on it. Several years later, I had occasion to talk to him, and the first thing he said to me, with genuine embarrassment, was an apology for being such an ass. He was married by that point, and, I like to think, much more mature. He has two beautiful daughters now, and I like to think he will teach them to watch out for Dick Burly. ‘Cause you know he’s still going to be roaming college campuses in fifteen years.
August 27th, 2006 at 8:51 am
Its odd how those type of things come out of nowhere and get you, isn’t it.
There is Karma…and it does tend to fall down on the guys like DB. But, Julie, I felt my gut twist for you when I read the line about trust. When people are so shitty….it just makes no sense
August 27th, 2006 at 11:09 am
What Mom-101 said – you can’t really appreciate the good ones for what they are unless you’ve had a taste of the bad.
That said, I never want my daughter to taste the bad. I never want her to hurt the way you did and the way I have, in the past.
August 27th, 2006 at 2:59 pm
Back then I always thought my family gave me too much advice about who I was dating. Now I realize they gave me far too little.
August 27th, 2006 at 3:09 pm
It’s hard for me to believe that people can be so cavalier in their abuse of trust and actually wear it like a medal.
August 27th, 2006 at 4:07 pm
I knew SO many guys like that in college. I was Miss Art Fag Alterna-chick so I had a general disdain for all those smuggish fraternity types but my BFF’s boyfriend was in one so I was around them a lot and that smooth operator shit even got past my barbed wire a time or two and I had a few rumors spread about me, as well. The best part , though, was when i confronted one of those guys in front of all his friends. He was so tongue tied, he stuttered an apology and everyone heard it. Asshole.
That Animal House wannabe was a jerk and I’d bet money he’s gotten his own comeuppance several times over by now.
August 27th, 2006 at 4:41 pm
Awww that must have been a heart thumper when you heard about him saying you trusted him. I was in a long distance relationship and ended up kissing someone at college. That was it, just one kiss and I told my boyfriend who forgave me. It was the lust for me and I was lonely all the way from my bf and all. However at least I told my boyfriend about the kiss!
THen he repaid me by going travelling with another girl (someone I knew) on a trip while we were still dating! I found out about that as he had lied to me!!
August 27th, 2006 at 6:13 pm
while my similar experience wasn’t in college, I got burned badly, and had the opportunity for retribution later. several times, in fact, as the years passed. and the best part was that, while he aged, and looked like it (he was, I think, about five years my senior), I continued to look better than I had when we dated. so his advances, after the screwing-over, became more pathetic and transparent, and sort of desperate, and one time I even found myself being chased by him as I ran into a building so as to keep up the pretense I hadn’t noticed him.
haHAHAHAHhahaha. fuck you, man. I hope that someday you have a daughter and you’re loathe to let her out of your sight because of your ass-hattery.
August 27th, 2006 at 6:49 pm
It’s funny how my hubbie and I were reminiscing about college during dinner tonight too. Luckily for me, I never dated anyone in college, just one of my rules. And ended up with my hubbie senior year, and almost 9 years later, he still makes me tremble when he’s near.
August 27th, 2006 at 10:34 pm
Ah, freshman year boyfriends. I think I’ll keep those memories buried, thank you.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:42 am
Well, previous commenters have elaborated on most of the telling points in this post, so I’ll just add my two cents of conclusion: What an asshole.
August 28th, 2006 at 7:21 am
What a weasel. Animal House really captures so well a lot of the “types” that college guys fall into. I hope the grown-up Dick Burley has daughters so he can spend his nights panicked that they will end up with guys like him….better that than if he has sons who he can mold into Dick Jr’s.
August 28th, 2006 at 7:23 am
I think that’s the worst feeling of all – being duped by someone you trusted. Ick. Guys like Dick deserve what comes their way, because the bad stuff always comes around. And thankfully, the good stuff does too.
August 28th, 2006 at 7:59 am
I was going to offer my sympathies, however you did end up with one that can be called the cream-of-the-crop, so I’ll just offer my congratulations instead!
August 28th, 2006 at 8:15 am
If Dick were here I’d kick him in it.
I had a “Dick” too. We were engaged when he slept with my best friend. He went to my mom’s house last week (what the crap?! I haven’t seen him in almost 10 years!) to tell her that he’d just gotten another divorce and wanted to get in touch with me now that he was “medicated”. My mom was like “…Jenny who? Haven’t seen her in years.”
Once a dick…always a dick.
August 28th, 2006 at 8:48 am
Oy, the asshole college boyfriend. Not everyone had one but I did. Dick sounds very familiar to me.
The best thing about having gone through that experience is the lessons we learn though. I bet you were able to see through that kind of bullshit forevermore after dating him.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Well, you are officially the only person I know who could get depressed by watching Animal House.
BTW, I refer to some of my ex-boyfriends as Dick. I believe that may be a very common pseudonym. I’m sure some blasts from my past have nice nicknames for me as well….
I am Bitch, damn glad to meet ya.
August 28th, 2006 at 3:10 pm
Crap. I still haven’t seen Animal House. I must be the only one on the planet now.
August 28th, 2006 at 5:24 pm
I had one of those too. It’s horrible when you realize that someone has been completely insincere and you didn’t really know them like you thought you did. I was so hurt when I found out I was being talked about behind my back, cheated on and generally being disrespected. I had never encountered that before and, luckily for me, haven’t since.
January 21st, 2008 at 6:17 pm
Mine was named Ray (and James – yup, I’m a sucker) and I really hope my girl never meets one of them. I guess we all do. Wow, you nailed this one, I don’t think I’d be able to sum it out without using the f word less than 100 times.
May 5th, 2009 at 5:44 am
[...] betrayed by a man is a rite of passage for women. We trust implicitly, even when logic tells us not to, and we feel utterly ridiculous when we find out what’s been going on behind our backs – or [...]