Book Fair Beauties

Last week, I was sitting at the Rec. department while Wesley played kickball.  Kickball is usually a time that the mother are allowed to gab while the kids are entertained, but this week, I was alone. Apparently the other mothers have other things to attend to that don't solely involve the events that revolve around their child's lives... weird I know...

The kids this day also had some lady at school reward them for selling their parents overly priced lovely wrapping paper and stale scrumptious chocolates with 'goody bags' filled will cheap quality prizes. (Wesley didn't get one of this bags because I'm a wretched Mother who refuses to waste money on cheap non-sense for my kid to receive a stretchy sticky hand that is just as affective at slapping me from the back of the van as the one we get for 25 cents from a quarter machines)
The temptations of the contents of these bags were too strong for some kids and one by one, dismissed themselves from the game. Being the solo parent, I was designated as the one who would help open all of these plastic wrapped trinkets. Once all were opened and satisfied with their mystery discoveries, a little girl beside me, informed me that they were also having a book fair at the school that day and she got the most amazing poster of Justin Bieber.

My "Oh really?" response was all she needed to haul this awesomeness out of her book bag, shoving this pre-pubescent boy in my face for a thural examination, while her eyes seeped out the uncontained love for this Mr. Bieber. This little Bieber Lover caught the eye of a fellow Bieber Lover still participating in the kickball game and instantly left my side to join in an uncontrolled giggle session with Bieber Lover #2 while pawing at the book fair purchase.

Smiling to myself, while shaking my head, and thought to myself, "I just don't get it. Just Bieber? Really girls?" and as my eyes feel on my own Sweet-ums playing with the toys attached to her car seat I realized, one day, she would be as excited about a boy on a poster as these girls. And with that realization, it was as if the memory gate was busted open and visions of New Kids On The Block over sized pins, posters, and notebooks, that were often purchased at these very school book fairs, started uncontrollably flooding my thoughts.

And it didn't stop there.

In fact, at one point in my childhood, I was in love with Andrew Keegan. And like these two Bieber Fans, I shared this love with a good friend, a current blog reader, and someone I wouldn't dare out *cough* EMILY *cough*.  We talked about him, drooled over posters of him, and in our hearts of hearts we loved Andrew Keegan. Our love was so blinding, we convinced ourselves that if we cooked spaghetti and threw it at the wall to stick, the moons would align, and our love would will the spaghetti to form into the numbers which would lead us to his direct phone line. Determining spaghetti shaped numbers is no easy task, but a 10 digit number was forming. We got hung up on the actual dialogue of what we were going to say when he answered, we chickened out and never called, which is probably for the best, because I don't know if our hearts could have handled the disappointment of being rejected by an automatic operating system.

The resurfacing of this memory thrilled me, not only did it plastered an instant smile on my face and give me a reason to randomly laugh through out the days to follow, but allowed me to be on the side line, reminded of a simpler time, when just whispering the name of the larger then life boy on a poster, in your best friends ear, caused such pure joy with an unspoiled reality. A reminder I was thankful to being a bystander to and looking forward to the day, Josephine asks for a few extra dollars to buy a poster at the book fair she'd like to bring home.

(But seriously people.... I think you'll agree that Emily and I had some pretty great taste!)