Ron Burgeron’s crush on Betty-Lou

Ron Burgeron had a crush on Betty-Lou Schaeffner

Mr and Mrs Schaeffner’s shop in Bovine, Texas

The old school of Bovine was so small that boys and girls sat in one room together. Next to Comet, Bubba, Teddy and some other kids, there was Ron, and of course the “belle” of Bovine: Betty-Lou.
She was a daughter of the local shop owner, Mr Schaeffner.

Ron Burgeron was secretly in love with her. That is, Ron thought it was a secret, but everybody in the class and everybody in Bovine, knew that Ron had a crush on Betty-Lou. E.g. when it was Ron’s turn in class to fill up the ink pots at the tables of the children, he always pored too much ink in Betty’s pot because he got all caught up in looking at her and thus forgot to stop poring in time.

Poor Ron, instead of getting some positive attention of Betty-Lou, she just got angrier and angrier at him. “You ruined my dress”, she would cry, “again! You’re as dumb as them cows!”.

When Ron grew up, the thing didn’t change much. Well, it did, but then for the worse. Ron’s infatuation with Betty-Lou just got worse. Ron use to refer to her as his “Yellow Rose of Bovine”.
Now you must know, that this doesn’t refer to normal rose (Rosa in Latin) but to a kind of cactus, known in Latin as Opuntia Engelmannii. According to Ron, this was just the perfect description for Betty-Lou, because the Bovine Rose is prickly on the outside, but juicy and soft on the inside. And when the Opuntia blossoms, it does so in the most beautiful yellow color.

Unfortunately the juice of the Bovine Rose was poisonous, and so was Betty-Lou for Ron. She never blossomed for old Ron Burgeron, sure didn’t do!

The most awkward thing happened on Betty-Lou’s 16th birthday

Ron had written a song for Betty-Lou and decided to sing it for her under her bedroom window right at the start of her 16th birthday.
In the middle of the night Ron got up and went to Bovine to get in time under her window. At first daylight, Ron started to play his guitar sang his song for Betty-Lou. Much to his pleasant surprise the bedroom window opened !
The singing Ron stared right in the eyes of Mr Schaeffner. “What on earth are you doing there, you stupid boy?”, Mr Schaeffner yelled at Ron. And before Ron knew, Mr Schaeffner threw out his piss pot and hit Ron right on the head. Most unfortunately the pot wasn’t empty at that moment.

So, Betty-Lou Schaeffner never knew about the song Ron had written for her. And so can’t we because Ron forgot all about the original text; because of the head trauma he used to say.
But we can enjoy the text Ron Burgeron made to his song after the bedroom window incident (see below). Ron used to sing this when sitting in front of his trailer while encompanying him self on his guitar.
A recently song version of this song is available here.

Betty-Lou of Bovine, by Ron Burgeron
(use melody of Yellow Rose of Texas)

There’s a yellow rose in Bovine, that I was singing to.
Nobody else could love her, as much I would do.
I cried so when she left me, it was so long ago.
I never saw her back again, but can not let her go.

She’s the sweetest Rose of Bovine, this trailer ever knew.
Her eyes as big as cow’s eyes, they sparkled in the dew.
Her father called me stupid boy, and threw his pot at me,
but Betty-Lou of Bovine, is the only girl for me.