This is the first in a three-part series in which each of the writers for the CGB submitted an article on the same topic, which means the articles this week are going to either delight you or make you sick with all the gushy sweetness.
Please to email your own experiences on the topic to [email protected] and we'll post them on Friday. C'mon! It will be fun!
A month ago, I ran into a boy that I "went with" in sixth grade. (Aside: The term "going with" makes for some very uncomfortable verbiage when you're trying to change to past tense or some kind of participle. I even checked a grammar guide to avoid sounding like an idiot, but when you're talking about some boy that you liked in the sixth grade, nothing comes out sounding idiot-free).
I had to get new tires put on my car and he turned out to be one of the tire boys. (Second aside: hottest boys in the Pacific Northwest work at Les Schwab Tire Factory. Mr. Schwab, I don't know who does your hiring, so please pass this on: MEOW.)
This is how boys and sixth grade worked for me: a boy would say he liked you, but never to your face—only to your friend and she would have to find out if you liked him back. If you did, one day he'd send a note to you that read "Will you go with me? Check one." and the yes box would be HUGE and the no box would be tiny and sometimes there would be a maybe box.
So, you'd check whichever box (peer pressure dictated that you check the yes box). And then you'd never talk to the boy again.
You'd pretty much break up the same way.
(In retrospect, I doubt the boys even really liked girls. We probably forced them to like us.)
With the exception of TP.
TP would ask girls to go with him and then he'd give them a necklace. It was a fake emerald and diamond chevron necklace from Avon. And when you broke up, you had to give it back. I think every girl in the sixth grade wore that necklace, and when it came my turn to go with TP (because the OTHER thing that happens in sixth grade is that every girl goes with every boy at least once—or at least that's how it worked in my sixth grade), I got the necklace. I never wore it, though. I put it in my sock drawer, but when we inevitably broke up, I DIDN'T GIVE IT BACK. In fact, I may still have it, but unless there's a way I can google my house, I'm not looking for it to find out for sure.
So, in thinking about TP, I got to thinking about other Boys I Have Loved.
HP:
Also in sixth grade. He was a very nice boy that I liked very much. One day, his friend gave me a Mrs. PacMan mini backpack full of Bazooka bubble gum and a tiny note from HP that said, "You are a fox. Will you go with me?" Hello—of course. In fact, I don't think we ever broke up. Oh dear. I'm not sure how I'll break this bit of news to the husband. Doesn't this make me some kind of bigamist?
MM:
Starting in the 8th grade and continuing on well through high school, I was in love with one MM. In fact, I even asked for him for Christmas one year. My love was largely unrequited, though. The only recognition I ever got from him was the time he called me "Grease Monkey" because I'd taken auto shop.
The year of the Kevins:
There was a year that I think I was in love with every Kevin I knew. You could have been 750 pounds, sitting in your own filth and eating nothing but garlic and cabbage and I would have worshipped the very ground you walked on. The most embarrassing thing that happened that year? Writing down the names of every Kevin I loved and LOSING IT IN THE HALLWAY ONLY TO HAVE NUMBER ONE KEVIN ON THAT LIST FIND IT OH MY GOODNESS I COULD HAVE DIED ON THE SPOT.
(Speaking of the year of the Kevins, I ran into one of the Kevins not long ago and he looks exactly the same as he did back then, and he plays pro baseball, but without all the acne. Upon returning home and googling his name, however, I found out that in fact he's not even playing minor league baseball—he's on a CITY LEAGUE team. Some things never change, I guess.)
DM:
DM was the beginning of my older man phase. DM was 22 when I was 17. DM had his own apartment, his own car and a good job. DM was also a major nerd and I really didn't like him. He gave me scarves for my birthday. When you're 17, the LAST think you want for your birthday is SCARVES. Good thing I dumped THAT loser, right?
Wrong.
Now that I'm wearing my Mom goggles, I realize that DM was very much the catch. He was a complete gentleman, spoke fluent French and got along with MY PARENTS. It also helps that he now lives and works in Paris (FRANCE, you idiot!) and is SMOKIN' HOT.
SW:
I dated SW for six months when I was a senior in high school. SW drove my family crazy. He had a big, loud truck. He drove up and honked for me and I would go a runnin.' (In his defense, if he left his truck unattended, my brothers would let the air out of his tires—even the spare.) He had barely graduated from high school and didn't go to church and went hunting every saturday and nearly got us both arrested that time we were caught by the police making out in a state park after hours. Ah, young love.
SW dumped me for another woman and I NEVER saw it coming.
The boys after SW are kind of a blur, mostly because by then I was in college and nobody really stands out and also because I met the man who was to be my husband only a year later. In the end, my husband is the best of all—he gave me jewelry that I still keep in my sock drawer, he thinks I'm still a fox, he doesn't call me grease monkey even when I know something about a car that he doesn't, he doesn't lie about being a pro baseball player, he's never given me a scarf for my birthday and he hasn't dumped for another woman. All in all, I'm pretty dang lucky.
I'd comment on this, but what I would say will be posted this week so I'll leave it at that.
By the way, did you see that we got a hit from some freak who searched "walloped bottoms?" And we came up like 3rd or 4th! Ack! And HAHAHAHAHA! Sicko!
Posted by: GAF | 05 October 2004 at 11:07 AM
Ok who's the sicko? Maybe one of has put all sorts of raunchy meta data in your site's header tags so that search engines are pointing people that search for that stuff to this site....hehehe. I'm just sayin...
Posted by: mikie | 06 October 2004 at 06:59 AM