Just Honk For Crying Out Loud

I am a firm believer in buying anything kids are selling at the side of the street. It's not like it's that expensive and it usually tastes good.

I used to sell stuff when I was little and I hated seeing car after car pass by without so much as a glance my way. And when someone would stop I would get so so excited and I would just smile my little heart out. It felt awesome!

A couple weeks ago I was going over the over-pass and there was a group of little boys jumping up and down on the sidewalk making that "honk" sign with their arms. I saw like 3 cars pass by them without doing a thing!

When I got to them I honked a million little ones and then one really long one and they were SO happy! They smiled so big and waved so hard and looked at each other and smiled.

Was that so hard? I didn't have to pull over. I didn't have to spend any of my change. I just honked and they were satisfied.

Then the other day I was driving down the road and it was very very windy. I could feel it pushing the car. I came upon this little girl standing on the sidewalk all by herself. The wind was pushing her over and she was wearing this little shawl thing that kept blowing off. And then I read the little white sign she was holding up.

It said, "Honk!"

Now that is dedication! You should have seen how much effort it took her to stand in the same place without the wind carrying her away!

So of course, when I passed her I went honk honk honk honk HOOOONNNNNKK!!! And she smiled so big and waved at me and she was happy.

So please. Next time you pass a little kid selling something, take like 2 seconds and fifty cents out of your life to please them. And if you really can't stop, at least honk! It will make both of you feel a little better about yourselves.

Sixth Grade

In the lovely grade of six, I was new to the school.

My teacher was Mrs. Jenkins.

She was known among the sixth graders as the most strict of the teachers, but I liked her. The thing I remember most about her was that she would always yell, "{insert name here, usually Rex}, THAT WAS SO OUTTA LINE!!!!!!!!!" when someone {Rex} would do something bad.

One day we were grading a worksheet. Everyone was talking, talking, talking and Mrs. Jenkins just couldn't handle it.

So she said to the class, "Alright if you speak one more word then you will be copying from the dictionary during the read-a-thon!"

And it was silent.

Then Rex spoke.

"REX! THAT WAS SO OUTTA LINE. YOU'RE COPYING FROM THE DICTIONARY."

"Okay," Rex said.

And it was silent again. For the rest of the grading process.

Then we were done and we were counting up the questions to see how many points it would be worth. We were counting, counting, counting and then Mrs. Jenkins said, "I got 23."

I said, "Ya, that's what I got."

And guess what she said.

"You're copying from the dictionary."

WHAT??!?

So when the read-a-thon came it was me and Rex copying from the dictionary while everyone else snacked on their granola bars and perused their little stories.

Me. And Rex.

That's just not right.

Hence, my elementary years concluded.

Fifth Grade

Unfortunately, I have pretty much forgotten everything that ever happened to me in fifth grade. So I don't have any good stories.

But I will tell you the two things I do remember from that year in my life:

1. Our teacher read us the entire Series of Unfortunate Events books. I thought they were awesome.

2. My friends and I would always play kick ball at recess. I was terrible at kick ball. I couldn't kick the ball very far. I couldn't catch the ball worth poo. I probably didn't run very fast. But I still thought it was fun.

My bff was the best girl kick ball player and she was always one of the team captains.

So at the beginning of recess the captains of the two teams would stand in front of the kick ball playing mass of children and take turns picking someone to be on their team.

I was always picked first.

And trust me, it wasn't because of my skills. It was because of my connections with the people up top. Aka the captain.

I always felt kind of dumb when she would pick me first because I knew I had no skills and I knew everyone else knew it. BUT I was so so glad she did because I didn't want to be among the ones picked last because of their skill lackage. I always felt bad for them. I was glad I had friends in high places who would allow me on their team first even though I was certainly not an asset.

So. Moral of the story = be nice to the skill-less because someday they might blog nice things about you.

Fourth Grade

Oh boy.

In fourth grade there was a pleasant little fellow in my class named Josh. He had a bit of a crush on me and everyone knew it. There was another rambunctious little bumpkin in my class named Rylie. He had a bit of a crush on my bff and everyone knew it. Believe me, they didn't try to hide it.

One day Josh showed up at recess with a precious little gift.

A heart necklace.

From him.

To me.

Of course, me being my fourth grade self, had to absolutely REFUSE it and run away onto the playground.

So Josh passed the item in question over to his buddy Rylie. Rylie then proceeded to offer it to my bff.

Of course, she being her fourth grade self, had to absolutely REFUSE it and run away onto the playground with me.

For the remainder of recess they continued to offer it to me, only to be refused, then offer it to her, only to be rejected once again. Over and over.

So, you know those adult ladies that stand outside every recess to keep an eye on things? Well I was really fabulous friends with one of them and I decided to ask her opinion on the subject at hand.

This was her advice: "Take it. It doesn't matter if you like him back. A boy is offering you a necklace. That's free jewelry! I'd take free jewelry any day."

I thought about that for like 2 seconds straight and determined that she was right.

Then good old Josh came walking up and offered me the necklace one more time.

I took it and said, "Thank you."

All his friends went insane. "AHHHHHH SHE TOOK IT! OH MY GOSH!"

And then I put it on.

And I wore it for the rest of the day.

*As a little side note, I would like you to notice that ALL my teeth are missing. This is fourth grade mind you. I was a bit of a late bloomer. When all my buddies were losing their teeth and getting special prizes in first grade, I was over there sucking my thumb with my baby teeth chompin all over. By the time I started losing teeth, it was old news and no one cared. But my mommy did and that's what counts.

Third Grade

You see this child with her flowery shirt and her sweet, innocent little smile? Don't be deceived.

Back in the day, children used to play outside in the snow during recess. I remember putting on my snow pants and boots and coat every morning and heading off to school.

One day during recess, there was a ton of snow all over the field and everyone was rolling giant snowballs and building forts and what not.

Now, usually I was a sweet little angel child. But for some reason, on this day a devil took over and I became an evil little thing.

I went over to this fort that people were building and I started kicking it. Kicking it!

I just couldn't control myself. I just kept kicking and kicking and laughing and destroying and I felt no remorse whatsoever.

Then the bell rang and we went in.

You know how people say there's a first for everything? Well after recess I had my first experience getting in trouble.

Mrs. Vietti (who was not even my teacher) called me into her room and gave me a speech. She told me that it was not nice to ruin people's creations and that I needed to go apologize to all the children whose feelings I had hurt. And the whole time she was talking, I just sat there in stunned silence thinking to myself, "I can't believe I'm actually getting in trouble. Only the bad kids get in trouble! I'm not bad. I can't be bad. I should never have kicked that fort. That was so bad. This can't be happening, oh no. OH NO."

After her speech, I apologized to the victims of my wrath and then proceeded miserably to my class. I deemed that to be the worst experience of my entire elementary experience thus far. If only I could have seen what was coming in sixth grade...

Second Grade

As you know, I was born with a very strong "moral compass."

I was also born with some mad spelling skills. Every Friday we would have a spelling test and I would ALWAYS get 100% and I never even had to study.

One Friday, we were in our routine spelling test, when I heard the teacher say, "Number 10: Whose."

My mind went blank. I specifically remember searching for that word in my brain and all I could see was a black screen.

I thought, "Whose? Whose?? I KNOW that word. I have spelled it a million times!! This can't be happening, oh no. OH NO."

And then it happened. I just took one little teeny tiny puny little baby peek at the paper belonging to the girl sitting across from me and there it was, that fateful word: w-h-o-s-e.

And I thought, "Oh yes, of course, W-H-O-S-E. I knew that. I DID."

And then I wrote it down on my paper.

And I felt like poo.

I felt like poo because I knew I had just cheated and even though I really did know the word deep down, I had to cheat to remember it and I just felt like pure, dark poo.

So I made a promise to myself right then and there that I would NEVER cheat again, no matter what the circumstances.

Thus, my moral compass was set even straighter and to this day, I will not cheat. So don't even ask.

First Grade

If you have ever wondered how my teeth got so pearly white, it all started in first grade.

Mrs. Palmer was my teacher but in that school they would split the students up to different teachers for the different subjects like math and reading. For those subjects, Mrs. McDonald was my teacher.

Mrs. McDonald taught me many important lessons in life.

I specifically remember the day she taught us the different points on the numbers to point to when we were adding. You know, like on the 5 you point to the four sharp points and the one round point on the belly. If you are lost then go back to first grade and do a little reviewing.

I also remember the day she taught us how to spell "Leprechaun." That came in handy in second grade but that's a story for a different day.

Anyway.

One day we had a lesson about brushing our teeth. She even had a guest speaker come and do a demonstration for us.

Here is the only thing I remember her saying to us that day, "So, you're supposed to brush your teeth for a whole minute without stopping! I know I definitely need to work on that because I don't brush my teeth for very long."

I was shocked. How could a teacher not even brush her teeth long enough?!

I learned two important lessons that day.

1. Teachers don't know everything and they don't do everything right and I was just going to have to get used to it.

2. I really needed to practice brushing my teeth for a whole entire minute because I wasn't brushing mine nearly long enough and I was definitely going to get cavities if I didn't change my ways asap.

So I did. I brushed my teeth for a whole minute and then looked at the mirror to admire my good work. And it's obvious all my hard work has paid off. I mean look at these babies!

Jk. Jk.

That's better. Kind of.

Kindergarten

In honor of big bad me graduating in 2 weeks, I have decided to do a post a day that tells something about each of my fateful years in elementary. Let's start with Kindergarten...

Something you may not know about me is that I am known in my family for my "digestion problems." Ya, uh....moving on....

One day my lovely little kindergarten class was gathered together on the orange carpet (which is disgusting now that I look back on all the gross stuff that has happened on that thing).

My teacher, Mrs. Pulley, was filling our brains with valuable knowledge, but I could not concentrate because I REALLY had to go to the bathroom.

I mean I reeeeaaaally had to go.

So...

She was asking us all these questions that we had to raise our hands to answer and apparently they were way too easy because EVERYONE was raising their hands!

But my hand was up for a different reason obviously.

So I was raising my hand so so high and so so frantically and shouting, "Mrs. Pulley, Mrs. Pulley" and she would never call on me because everyone else was doing the exact same thing.

I thought to myself, "This can't be happening, oh no. OH NO."

So I enlisted my friends around me to help get the teacher's attention.

Finally my friend Hannah was able to get Mrs. Pulley to call on her and she said, "Brittan really needs to go to the bathroom."

And Mrs. Pulley said, "Oh okay go ahead."

Hallelujah!

I jumped up and ran ran ran and I BARELY made it. And I am not exaggerating. It was close.

So let this be a lesson to all you kindergarten teachers out there. Give the students a little freedom! Don't make them ask you when they can go to the bathroom because I'm sure they know a lot better than you do. Trust me you will avoid many accidents by doing this.