Ode to comments - An excerpt from Awkward Begets Happiness-

Rachel, if you could get me some motivational speaking gigs, I would so be there. I love hearing myself speak and dancing around in front of people. I guess you could say it's one of my talents. If not, it's just something I love to do.

Heather, this one's for you. A little sample from my book. I know many Heathers. You are my favorite one. No offense to the other Heathers, but I have known you the longest. Maybe it is and maybe it isn't. Oh, and in response to the Mighty Mouse coloring book comment, which I'm not sure you saw, I didn't color in it because I was saving it. It was too cool to color. And now it is dust in the wind. Long live Mighty Mouse.

Buried Treasure

Starting in kindergarten and extending all the way through high school, my personality took some time to blossom. In high school, it usually took me a full semester, 4 months, to get comfortable and during the next four months, everyone would wonder who the weirdo was that had taken over my body. I did have some outgoing friends that inspired me to climb out of myself. One of those friends was named Stephanie.

Stephanie was always encouraging me to shine. When she called me up, we would go out and do things together. I turned into a semi-social butterfly instead of folding into some kind of stunted moth partly because of her. One particular Saturday Stephanie was bored.

When she called me up, she said we were going to make brownies. When she came over and told me were going to give them away, I groaned inwardly. The plan was to make brownies and take them to her boyfriend Frank. Do not get me wrong, Frank was a fantastic boyfriend for her and a great friend to me. I just did not want to make treats for someone else. Look at me, I am wasting away over here!

Besides that, I also reminded Stephanie about the never ending game of tag we encouraged in our circle of guy friends. Futile as it seemed, we insisted on playing a modified version of tag.

Instead of mutual running and tagging, our version was mostly giggly girls running up to boys and saying“Tag, you’re it. You’re it. Tag, come chase me. Hey, want to play?” Laughing off my qualms, Stephanie insisted on an offering of delicacies headed straight to Frank’s mouth.

After glorying in this confection perfection, we drove my sporty red Toby twenty minutes to Frank’s pad. Unfortunately, during a fateful timing accident, a policewoman also gave me a ticket for running a red light. I did not run it; I was in the middle of an intersection and did not want to block oncoming traffic. Truly undeserved, but given anyway, this ticket was a cause of grief on our otherwise joyful goody trip.

When we got there, Frank popped the door and showed us in. Stephanie presented him with the platter of brownies he courteously directed us to furniture. Stephanie sat by Frank on a bench and I sat on a cushy flowered chair across from them.

After arranging ourselves in comfort, Steph went into an elucidation of our Nazi policewoman experience. While doing so, Stephanie requested the plate of brownies and delved into its sugary goodness, accidentally dropping a tidbit onto her awaiting cleavage. This confection went unnoticed by Stephanie but was observed by Frank’s acute senses, who must have waited a full two minutes before abashedly pointing to her face and saying, “You’ve got something on your…”

Both Stephanie and I watched where his finger pointed and thought she had some chocolate on her face. Stephanie spotted her vixen opportunity and decided to play it coy. She slyly grinned and with a shimmy shake of her upper body said, “Oh, really? Why don’t you get it for me?” Poor Frank, confused and blushing responded, “Because I don’t want to.”

By that time I had realized the cause of Frank’s supreme embarrassment. I never saw any chocolate on Stephanie’s face, so I looked down to her chest. Lying somberly on a cushion of unabashed chest flesh, lay a fat brownie crumb. Since I now saw the situation from both vantage points, I let out a high pitched squeal. Sucking in gasps of air sandwiched between loud guffaws of laughter, I somehow managed to point out Stephanie’s lost morsel to her.

Mortified, she pinched the lost crumb between her thumb and forefinger and devoured it. Frank’s embarrassment was akin to Stephanie’s and as they both sat in astonished consternation I stood up to retrieve another delicious cookie. Stephanie swore off brownies before dying of embarrassment.

This story had to go into a book. Embarrassment happens to everyone including Stephanie, me, and Frank. Being a good sport makes any story worthwhile. Playing tag is a fun game when everyone plays. It stops being fun when nobody is serious about the game anymore.

When you stop paying attention to your garden, weeds sprout up and take over. Do not think you can plant a garden without taking care of it afterwards and expect a large harvest. Plants and relationships need time and care to develop to their full potential.

Moral: When people start leaving and paying attention to other things, the game loses its charm. Advice: Be a good sport and play the game with your whole heart.