Everyone remembers his or her first crush and his or her first broken heart.
Mine was in third grade. On the most romantic day of the year for a third grader: Valentine’s Day.
Well, it is not so romantic when you are eight and you don’t get a Valentine’s Day card. In elementary school we used to make our own mailboxes and it was required to give every kid in class a card of some sort. Most went with the generic Hello Kitty for the girls, or Spiderman cards for the boys. But everyone gave their best friends the biggest cutout hearts with lots of Hershey’s kisses.
My teachers always told us that the homemade cards were the most meaningful, so every year my mom and I would go to the store and buy all the supplies for my cards: glue, red and pink paper, pretty doilies, lollipops, and glitter pens. I was notorious for my amazing Valentine’s Day cards, due to my excessive use of pink, red, and silver glitter. In return, I always got the biggest and prettiest cards.
But in third grade, there was only one card I cared about: John Smith’s, whose name I changed to protect his pride. It was a typical third grade romance—after talking to each other once and racing each other across the monkey bars during recess, everyone decided that we were dating. Just because we had only spoken once did not mean that I did not expect a Valentine’s Day card.
On Feb. 14, everyone came to school with their homemade cards, some of them better than others (mine were still the best). Everyone distributed his or her cards, and I waited to see each one get placed in my mailbox. As we sat back down to look at our cards, I saw one card that was lacking. The heart was pointy, the glue was visible, there was no candy, and there were erratic patches of green glitter creating a hideous pattern!
It was from John Smith. He gave me the ugly card. Every other card was practically glowing, with a great deal of effort spent to make them perfect. And then there was John’s, ugly and obviously lacking effort. He obviously didn’t want to go out with me anymore. We would no longer race each other on the monkey bars during recess.
Homemade cards are no longer my favorite; the sentiment involved is too obvious. There is a big difference between a flimsy, self-decorated paper heart and a store-bought Hello Kitty card with candy. I will never forgive John Smith for ruining what used to be my favorite holiday with his careless card and use of glitter.
