Birthday Cakes and My Mistakes

Many years ago, for some childhood birthday, my mother threw me a little shindig. In those days the most intimate circle of friends for me was comprised of cousins, and they duly arrived, bearing gifts and big smiles. One of the families, however, had clearly forgotten the party and arrived a little out of breath. Their gift had been obviously purchased at a gas station on the way over. They assured me that it was only PART of my gift and that the second and BIGGER portion was yet to come.

It took me several months of springing at them hopefully whenever they swam into view (might I add, bearing NO gift) to realize that in fact, the promised second part of my present was not coming. In fact, the second part DID NOT EXIST. It was a white lie. A red herring. A carrot at the end of a stick wrapped up in twenty seven nesting boxes and tied all around with pink ribbons and caught in some inaccessible dimension.

I accidentally revisited this lesson at school just the other day. Last semester a wonderful writing professor who loved my work asked to keep my final paper, without his comments added, to read to future classes. He promised to send me an email with his thoughts separately.

Every day for the next month I hopefully checked my email, and even nebbishly sent him notes a couple of times, false cheer and exclamation marks spread thickly over my words. 

“Hi, Dr. Simpson! I hope you are having a WONDERFUL summer!! I’ve been enjoying it, especially with all the rain!! It’s like we’re Seattle, huh?! Haha!! So, I’m sure you’ve been enjoying your time off but I was wondering if you’d had a chance to …” 

Blah blah blah. You get my drift. I’m ashamed to admit that I crafted two or three of these odiously lighthearted missives before I gave up, at least for the summer. But about thirty seconds after the fall semester began I jumped right back on the cart and started smacking the horse. 

Still no response. I was positive something was wrong with the email system. Come on, it's  Microsoft Outlook. You'd be suspicious too.

A couple of days ago as I was sitting in the King Center courtyard morosely chewing a burrito flavored power bar and pretending it was good, I spied him rocketing past me. “Dr. Simpson!” I bellowed, leaping up and startling the guy who was enjoying his actual real life burrito across from me. (Oh, another thing I’ve learned at school: just because someone shares your table in the courtyard at school, it doesn’t mean they want to talk to you. It’s like sharing an elevator. Seriously. Behave like everyone else and act like your phone is the most interesting thing in the world.)

He turned with a hunted look. “Oh, hi,” he stammered. “Uh, I’m really really late for a class so I can’t talk but I got your emails and I am sending you my comments later tonight! I swear. Sorry it’s taken so long but your paper got buried in a big stack of other paperwork and I’ve just been … I swear … tonight … I haven’t forgotten … “ the last few words were lost as he barreled away from me.

Pleased, I threw the rest of my healthy snack away and celebrated with a Snickers bar. 

The next morning, I checked and re-checked. Still no email. At the end of the day, still nothing. A week later, still nothing. It was then that the memory popped into my head. This was my gas station gift! There is no part two. I shared this epiphany with a friend who listened kindly and then gave me his keen, insightful advice. “Just get over it.”

Okay, fine. Thanks, man. But I kind of can’t. 

So, what is the acceptable time to wait until you check something off your list as a bad debt? I still don’t know. But then I’m the kid still waiting for the second half of her birthday present over here.