A Christmas Crush(ed)

If memory serves me well, I believe the following chunk of my Christmas history took place in the 4th or 5th grade so that would be around 1984 or so. I was living in Nashua at the time and was attending Sunset Heights Elementary School. Around this time in my life I had discovered that girls are no longer icky but awesome. What a grand time for a boy.

The super hot young lady at my school was a girl named Leah. I wish that I was good at remembering names as well as faces but alas, it is only face recognition for me so I cannot pass along her last name. Anyway I had the biggest crush on this girl along with half of my class. I was that creepy kid who would always peek at her in class and leer, ogle and stare while at recess and on the bus.

Now it wasn’t like she had no idea who I was as we spoke every day but of course only as friends. I definitely could not tell her that I liked her. That would be incredibly embarrassing and I didn’t want to risk what little reputation that I may have had. I finally got up the gumption to let someone know about my infatuation. One evening while I was being dragged Christmas shopping with my mother for Pops I let her know my little secret. I asked her about buying a little present for my little female friend.

Moms was very helpful, as I remember, with choosing a nice girly gift with what little allowance I still had in my possession. It was decided that I would get a nice pair of diamondesque-looking earrings. We took them home and I believe I wrapped them up all nice and neat all by myself. I kept them hidden in my room until the big day arrived.

Once Christmas morning arrived I was giddy as a school girl as I am sure most grade school aged kids are. I woke up early along with my sister and we dragged our parents kicking and screaming from their warm slumber. We tore through our gifts with a fervor, tossing paper, ribbon and bows haphazardly around the room. After a nice breakfast I knew it was time to embark on my journey. It was one of the first in many towards manhood.

Try to remember that this was New England and New England winters are, to put it lightly, a bitch. I remember that there was a ton of snow which had blanketed the area that year and to make it even more interesting it was currently spitting snow at a serious rate. I pulled on my boots and draped myself in my hearty winter coat, gloves, hat and scarf and prepared for the long, arduous trek of, and no I am not exaggerating, at least four miles. That is four miles using eleven year old legs in 18 or so inches of snow that was accumulating at an alarming rate into a blustery wind that stung any exposed flesh and made your eyes water, then freeze to your face.

By the time I had made it half way to my destination, the point of no return, snot was dripping incessantly from my nose and my teeth were unable to cease chattering. I felt around for the tiny gift that was shoved deeply into my pocket to be positive that I still had it and the box had not slipped deeply into the snow only to be found in the spring thaw. Luckily, it was still along for the trip.

After what seemed like days but was more like an hour or a little more I reached Leah’s front door. I knocked lightly as not to send stabbing pains throughout my poor little numbing hand. After a short wait her mother opened the door with a confused then smirking look. I built up all of my courage to ask to speak to Leah. She quickly appeared at the door in her winter pajamas (wow, what a major coup to be the only boy in school to see her in her night clothes!) but never invited me inside. She stood there uncomfortably at the threshold to her home shivering. At this point I reached into my pocket to retrieve her gift. I handed it to her sporting the biggest smile I could muster considering the biting winds and sticky snot and frozen tears. I am sure that I looked like a big mess.

I wished her a merry Christmas and was reciprocated with a slight grin and a thank you. At that our exchanges were completed with a friendly “I’ll see you back at school” and we both retreated awkwardly. On my miserable trip back home, I felt thrilled initially that I had accomplished my goal but then defeated when I realized how worthless our conversation had been in her doorway. I do not know what I expected to come from the giving of a gift but I thought a little bit more.

In the days at school afterwards there was no mention of what I had done. I told no one at school and can only assume that she did not either. Generally a good teasing would be in order by someone but it never happened. We never became closer friends, Leah and I, or anything else for that matter. Everything was status quo. One day several months later as we rode the bus back from school I noticed something in her ears. It appeared that she was wearing my earrings! My heart raced with excitement. I sauntered over to her seat and whispered “Nice earrings.”

“Thanks,” she said, “but they’re not yours.” Yikes, how about a nice dagger to the heart. I was deflated. Our conversations with each other became less and less and eventually I moved away to Hudson never to see her or any of my fellow Sunset Heights classmates ever again.