And so it Begins: Kindergarten Romance

I think it's safe to say that I had a more interesting love life in kindergarten than I did in the rest of my entire public school career. I don't know why, exactly, but it probably has something to do with the fact that when we were 5 and 6 years old, we were too young to be spoiled by the outside influences that mold kid's brains. We were thrust from the relative sheltered scenario of our homes into an alien world of different faces, different colors, and different customs. Each new person is an enigma that a young child is curious to learn about. Why do you look like that? How come you have no Daddy? A five year old feels no social boundaries, no guilt, and no shame.

However, you're just about at that age when you start trying to imitate your parents and older brothers and sisters, as well as strive for peer approval. So when I was five, I was in love with Alvin, along with all the other girls at Fords Elementary. Alvin was the cutest, prettiest little Latino boy you ever saw. He had golden skin, an elfin face with pudgy cheeks, and shiny dark hair in a bowl cut with a cowlick just over his left eyebrow. I used to pretend that Alvin and I would get married and have a big house with lots of dogs and I would make him Strawberry Crazy Cow cereal every morning, like a good wife would.

I declared my undying love by giving him a pretty picture I colored all by myself, hearts with arrows and love and kisses. I then received a talk from my mother about how such things were inappropriate and pushy. I don't know if Alvin's mom had a problem with me having hot pants for her son, or if our teacher - a warty hag named Miss Born - felt such non-academic tomfoolery had no place in her classroom, or maybe Mom just thought it was time to get a head start on spoiling my self esteem and providing good material for the therapy couch twenty years later. Who knows.

At the same time, there was a little boy in our class by the name of Peter who loved me and who I (naturally) felt was the ickiest dog-faced turd on the face of the planet. His ears stuck out a mile on either side of his head, which was too big for his pale and skinny body. He either had buck teeth or missing teeth, I can't remember which, but it didn't matter - there was no way I was letting Peter within shouting distance of my sacred personage.

It didn't help that my mother liked him, and would give me the presents he would deliver to our front door with an infuriating "That Peter is a nice boy." Whatever it was - a shiny stone, a picture from a coloring book tied with a flower - instantly ground under my Buster Brown-clad foot. It also didn't help that his mother shopped at the same grocery store that mine did, and they would stand and gossip while Peter chased me up and down the ice cream aisle, to the strains of jazzy elevator music.

At the end of the year, we had a "kindergarten graduation" party complete with music from a little record player. Miss Born encouraged her young charges to dance, and so provided some lovely waltzes for the young ladies and gentlemen. Across the crowded room I saw Alvin standing alone and, scenting my opportunity like a good little stalker, marched up to him and asked him to dance. It was then that Alvin lost his cool factor and fell from grace.

He wiggled. He jiggled. He waved his hands and squinted his eyes and stomped his feet, mainly all over mine, and not even remotely to the beat of the music. I prayed for the record to stop so I could make a quick escape. He looked like a whirling, twirling geek machine, frankly. I was so eager to get away from Alvin that I gratefully accepted a dance with...Peter. Who held my hands gently and carefully steered me back and forth in perfect rhythm, barely daring to actually speak to me and ruin his good fortune. It opened my eyes, let me tell you.

We moved away that summer.

Ever since then, whenever my love life is particularly miserable, I think back and try to remember the rough texture of that last coloring book picture in my hands; how it was rolled loosely, yet tightly enough to carefully tie a clover flower around the circumference.

I wish I could remember what the picture was.