It was a warm relaxing day, with spring break coming up. I was a 4^th grader at George Mason Elementary School. Throughout the school year I had a huge crush on this girl name Isabelle. She had luscious blonde hair with the body of a Victoria’s Secret angel. Every day during recess I would always gaze at her and try to impress her with my kick ball skills. All my buddies knew about my secret, and kept pushing me to man up and ask her out. Me being a 4^th grader, I had no dating skills in my repertoire. Also, the fact that I was awkward didn’t help at all. I had trouble expressing myself through words, especially when I was nervous.

Rumors started spreading that Isabelle liked me back and that made me feel more confident about my situation. I woke up one morning with the intentions of becoming a man and finally asking her out. I quickly jumped out of bed and did my usual morning routine that consisted of showering, brushing my teeth, getting dressed, and eating my mother’s delicious breakfast. I hopped on the bus and I was on my way to school. When I arrived to school, my confidence level slowly started deteriorating. I kept on putting words in my head to boost my self esteem. That was working until 10 minutes before recess when I realized that it’s time to follow through with the plan.

The teacher dismissed the class for recess and I sprinted to the line where the class proceeded to pick kick ball teams. I spotted Isabelle on the swing with a couple of friends, and at the moment I caught butterflies in my stomach. After a couple of innings playing kickball I decided that it was time to do it. I noticed Isabelle was now alone on the swings, and I decided to run over and sit on the empty swing next to her. On my way there I tripped over my own feet due to nervousness, but luckily I caught myself before anybody could notice. I finally reached the empty swing, and could smell Isabelle’s sweet perfume. There was an awkward silence for 30 seconds, but I eventually found the guts to say hi and in response she gave me a simple “Hey Ronny.” I ran out of things to say, so I decided to spill the beans and tell her straight up. I let her know that I thought she was pretty and that I liked her. It took her time to process what I said, and I could tell her cheeks were getting red. I didn’t know if this was a good thing or not so I just kept a smile on my face and waited for her response.

She let me know that she was already aware of my big crush, but I didn’t find that surprising because everyone in my 4^th grade class had a big mouth. Once again, we found ourselves in an awkward silence, but I broke that by asking her to be my girlfriend. Her response devastated me; she let me know that she thought I was weird, and basically laughed in my face right after she gave me a big loud NO. All the students and maybe even teachers heard my rejection and blurted out laughing. I felt so embarrassed and wanted to run home and hide. Good thing recess was over because I didn’t want to be outside much longer. I didn’t want to talk to anybody or be seen by anybody, so I hid in the bathroom with my backpack until it was time for dismissal.

It was a Friday, the last day before spring break and I was happy to find out that I had a whole 2 weeks for my embarrassing moment to blow away. To this day, I still have buddies that like to bring that up and joke around, but I learn from my mistakes and now I like to tell myself I have some kind dating skills in my repertoire. Isabelle and I still keep in touch through Facebook, but only as friends. We always bring up this event and get a good laugh at it. She apologized for giving me a mean answer, and embarrassing me like that, but in reality, I did it to myself and should have taken a different approach to the situation.