Raccoon Toons

I have always been a helpless romantic. In the 3rd grade, I had a crush on a girl in my class. Truth be told, I had liked her from the moment I first laid eyes on her in preschool 4 years earlier. You can sit there and tell me that a preschooler couldn’t possibly fall in love, but you’d be wrong. I may have only been 5 years old, but I remember that glorious moment all too well.

I arrived on the first day of preschool, and the teacher had me stand in the front of the room to introduce me to the other children. I’m sure I was quiet and shy, because that’s the kind of kid I was. And that’s when I saw her. There she sat on the brightly colored carpet looking up at me. Her glowing visage capturing my 5-year old gaze. She wore a green dress that had a white collar that had little designs on it like a fancy doily napkin. It was hot in a way that only preschoolers can define.

I remember studying the other children in the room, and then looking at her. There was no comparison. A few of the other kids had blank stares on their idiot faces. One or two others had snot dripping out of their noses. One child clearly had behavioral issues. These other kids couldn’t hold a candle to this lovely angel of the preschool. In that split second I knew she was kind, intelligent and lovely. She was perfect.

I didn’t waste any time. I immediately sat down right next to her and began my courtship of the prettiest little preschooler there ever was. We became friends. She would come to my birthday parties. I would go play at her house and chase her chickens. Once we got into an argument because she didn’t want to watch Transformers with me (I still count it as the moment our relationship fell apart). My childhood crush would continue all the way through the 8th grade. But I digress.

Back to the 3rd grade. It was Valentine’s Day, and every year it was the same. This was my chance to subtly tell my dear sweet love how I really felt about her. Every year I would select the most heartfelt or suggestive Valentine in my recently purchased selection (because those Scooby Doo Valentines can be pretty suggestive) and reserve it for her, my childhood sweetheart. Clearly if I gave her what was obviously the most endearing of my Valentines, she would realize we were meant for each other and we could run off and spend a lifetime of happiness and bliss together on the monkey bars. She always did like the monkey bars.

But every year my specially selected Valentines seemed to go unnoticed. Perhaps, I thought to myself, it was time to be a little more bold. After all, we were in the 3rd grade now. We were practically adults. It was time to declare my love more openly.

That night, I stressed about the situation as only a 3rd grader can. I picked out the most alluring Valentine I had and put it aside. I filled out all the other Valentines for all my other classmates and put them in the supplied envelopes. After addressing them all, only one Valentine remained. It was clearly the best one. Surely anyone who saw it would know that it was meant to be given only by those who had real and deep feelings of love and passion for someone. I filled out the card. I carefully wrote her name, practicing my cursive and trying my best to capture her beauty in the way I artistically swirled the letter “A” in her name. I placed the Valentine in the accompanying envelope. But it wasn’t enough. She needed to know how I felt.

And so I did one of the most profound and terrifying things of my young 3rd-grade life… I drew hearts on the envelope.

Now granted, there actually already were hearts on the envelope to begin with. My hearts were these extra little hearts that I drew inside the larger ones. But surely she would notice that I didn’t draw hearts on anyone else’s envelope, and she would KNOW that I did it for her as an expression of my deep and abiding love. The idea was frightening and I knew it would not be without consequence. I changed my mind a couple of times, tearing off the envelope and placing a new one on in it’s place. But before too long, I would succumb to my emotions and I would draw the hearts again. I repeated this process until I was completely out of envelopes, and stuck with my decision.

That night I barely slept. I stayed up all night, full of angst over the idea of delivering my Valentines Day card. How would she react to seeing I had drawn EXTRA hearts on the envelope? What if she hated it? What if she told her friends? I could be teased and made fun of for the rest of my elementary school life like that kid who ate boogers! But there was no going back now. I had to go through with it. My love must be made known.

The next day I brought my Valentines to school. In the afternoon we all traveled around the classroom and placed our cards and Valentines in the bags and boxes on people’s desk. I was so nervous. For a moment, I almost convinced myself that I shouldn’t go through with it. But I couldn’t give everyone in the class a Valentine except her! I was committed now. There was nothing I could do, but deliver my card to the bag on her desk.

I waited for the right moment. I made sure she was away from her desk handing out her own Valentines. I made sure no one else was nearby or watching me. I scouted the area like a trained expert in espionage. I knew my mission. I would get in, get out, and return safe. The package would be delivered.

With great speed, and great stealth, I completed my objective. Quickly I returned to my desk. It was done! My card had been delivered! Now all I had to do was wait. This was so nerve racking! My poor little heart couldn’t take it! I sat and discretely watched her desk from the corner of my eye. I waited for her to look through her bag of Valentines. My heart was racing. What had I done!? She’d probably never speak to me again! I watched and waited in terror. But she didn’t open any of her Valentines. The bell rang, and she picked up her bag, and she went home.

For the next several days I would try to gage how she behaved around me, wondering if she had received my declaration of love. But for some reason, she behaved as if nothing had ever happened. I couldn’t believe it. Here I had been through SO much, and she didn’t even seem to notice! But then I remembered why I loved her in the first place. She was the most intelligent girl in our grade, and she was kind. Surely, she had noticed. She was too smart not to notice. But she was kind. She knew how I felt about her, and she knew the other kids would tease me relentlessly if they found out. She was keeping the secret of my love to protect me! My heart swelled. What a girl!! I loved her more than ever before.

As the school years passed, I would repeat this Valentines tradition again and again. But with each year, our relationship would fade. Our paths diverged. Our interests changed. I saw less and less of her around school. Or maybe I was still too shy to talk to her. With each passing year we drifted further and further apart until I barely knew her. I heard she got married not too long ago. Regardless, we would never again be as close as we were in preschool. Perhaps that is why I had acted with such urgency on that first day of school.