Regardless of what our reality throws at us, human nature can be a pretty amazing thing to behold. Especially when the world is all sorts of vexed up and we need those wholesome moments from the before times.
There are some people out there that human our nature in ways that are endearing and sweet and awesome and kind, and it seems as though that Weird Al Yankovic is one of those folks.
You know Weird Al, right? Grammy winning musician?
Oh, also, a very funny guy who a satirist.
He didn’t really throw these Grammies out…. right?
He shared a story on his Facebook page recently that we all need right no, so let’s begin…
I was 12 years old in the 9th grade – younger than my classmates, and (as you may possibly be able to imagine) pretty awkward, shy and nerdy.
And I had a crush on Patrice Y., the girl who sat directly in front of me in math class (because the seats were all arranged in alphabetical order for some arbitrary reason).
Very relatable, your weirdness. Please continue…
Of course, Patrice would never in a million years have suspected that I had a crush on her, because like I explained… painfully shy.
But one day I decided I would make my big move – I decided to draw a picture of her and present her with it.
But because I didn’t want to give her the impression that I LIKED her or anything, I also drew pictures of EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN THE CLASS and handed those out as well, just to throw her off the scent.
See, that’s the type of mind that will later go on to create amazing art. Just as an FYI to you parents out there. Weird is wonderful.
Full disclosure, I tried to make Patrice’s picture a little bit better than everyone else’s, just to be subtle about my feelings.
Anyway, everybody seemed to like their drawings, and, as you may have predicted, my love life remained completely dormant for the next several years.
Not surprising. We’ve all been there.
Now then, on to the good part!
Okay, fast forward nearly half a century later… I’m checking my Twitter feed and I see some woman on there talking about how she used to sit in front of me during 9th grade math class.
Being slightly less shy at my current advanced age, I decided to follow up on this: I DM’ed her and asked if by any chance her name was Patrice.
Turns out, it was!
It was her – my 9th grade crush. I then followed up and asked, “Hey, by any chance do you happen to remember that one time I drew pictures of everybody in class?”
You know what happened next, right?
Yeah you do!
A minute later she sent me this photo.
She had saved it all these years.
I just felt like telling this story because, well… 2020 was arguably a pretty sucky year overall, but there were some real moments of joy sprinkled in here and there – and for me, this was definitely one of them.
Image Credit: Facebook/Weird Al
I need to learn to draw.
If any of my former crushes are reading this feel free to comment. Or if you’d like to share your own wholesome story bless the comments with some awesomeness.
Thanks, fam!
