“Charlotte’s Web” has shaped my life more than any other book…

My wife, Ladyshark, and I were driving around yesterday, running errands while listening to music on her new iPod. Right now, the yummy little device hosts a number of songs we both enjoy and a number of songs from our respective past, and very different, musical tastes. You see, we have a four-and-a-half age difference between us. So, back in the day, we both grew up during very different musical… “movements” (for lack of a better word). She, followed the “alternative” music scene, and myself, more the dance/hip-hop side of things. We took turns overruling each others song choices until we happened upon songs that we could agree on.

At one point, Ladyshark looked at me smiling and said, “You and I would not have hung out together at all if we went to school together growing up.” I replied, “You got that right. You were cool and I wasn’t.”

And when I say I wasn’t cool, I mean it… I was a big ol’ wannabe. Huge. Yeah, I had my friends and we had a lot of fun hanging out together. It’s just… I so desperately wanted to be cool — someone who people looked at and wanted to be like. I was lucky enough to find out, at the unbelievably mature age of seven, that I was not cool. Nor was it likely that I would ever be cool (actually, in hindsight, I mightn’t have removed myself from “cool” potential had I not pined so desperately to be cool).

It was grade two (or second grade as some of you might call it) not long before Christmas vacation. All of the students in my class had put names into a hat to exchange gifts. I had selected the name of a small girl in my class, KL. I didn’t really know her very well so, I wasn’t entirely sure what she might like. My mother helped me pick out a gift for her and after looking for a while, we decided on a book, Charlotte’s Web. Soon it was the last day before Christmas vacation. The day of our class party. It was finally going to be the time to exchange gifts. I was excited to see what I would get. I was anxious but even more excited to see how KL would like her gift.

Well…

She didn’t.

At all.

In fact, she hated it.

Thankfully (I guess), she didn’t actually inform me herself.

Still, the message certainly travelled like lightening. I still remember that specific moment like it was yesterday. As soon as the message had reached me, I instinctively looked over to her corner, only to have the reality of the words confirmed with the look of disgust on her face, and the faces of her friends standing around her.

I was utterly and monumentally crushed.

I felt like crying every last drop of moisture out of my scrawny little body but couldn’t. I desperately wanted needed to escape that moment but couldn’t. My classroom was what we used to call a “portable” — a kind of “temporary” stand-alone classroom separate from the main school building — and it was freezing outside with snow everywhere. Plus, our little pre-Christmas class party had just started. All I could do was sink into my chair, fold my arms on my desk and attempt to bury my face in my sleeves.

I couldn’t eat or drink anything.

Classmates who hadn’t yet heard what had happened kept coming over and asking me what was wrong. I just told them all that I had a headache — which was not uncommon for me. I even brushed off my teacher with the same lie just so I didn’t have to talk to anyone about it. She believed me and left me to my sleeves until the party was over.

Thankfully, being the last day before Christmas meant it was a short day.

I don’t remember any other details from that day other than the conversation with my mother about the “success” of the gift. I described the whole pathetic story to her and begged to know why we couldn’t have gotten her a better gift. A gift that she would have loved. A gift other than the one we had chosen for her. Any gift. Looking back, I can see my mother really did try to make me feel better. She just did not give me the answer I wanted to hear or an answer that could I process as valid at my age. She explained that we simply did not have enough money to buy anything more expensive for her gift, that Charlotte’s Web is a great story, and that the book was a good gift.

I was crushed again.

From that moment on, I was brutally aware that we didn’t have as much as everyone else did. I felt like a lesser person. I didn’t want to be a lesser person. I wanted to be someone that could be disgusted by receiving Charlotte’s Web as a gift. I was obsessed with becoming cool. I didn’t want to be me. I hated myself for a long time. I gave my mother a hard time when I couldn’t get the latest Nike shoes — which she eventually broke down and bought me (sorry Mom).

I have been plagued by that event for my entire life.

Even though I had, in essence, figured out how to move past it a long time ago, situations still seem to have a way popping up that make me feel like I’m seven again. I HATE it when that feeling comes back. It still feels that same as it did that day. Even though I am official against “cool”, I still desperately want to be someone that people look at and say, “Wow, I want to be just like him.”

In an earlier and unrelated conversation, my wife had laughed saying that I’m just like a little kid sometimes. For instance, I’ll do something and she’s noticed that I’ll look to see anyone’s watching, like a little kid looking for someone’s approval or praise. That’s why, Love. That’s why.

We had to read Charlotte’s Web later that year. I remember the teacher asking if anyone had read it yet. Nobody had. Little Miss KL did, however, shoot her hand into the air excited to be able to exclaim to everyone that she already owned a copy. Much to the praise for the teacher and her cool friends.

You’re welcome.

steelie

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13 comments
  1. How in the WORLD does someone not like Charlotte's Web?? I think I discovered that book right around second grade, too. I would've loved to get a copy. I know what you're talking about, though. I think I was the same way growing up, and I'm still a little like that now.

  2. "We had to read Charlotte’s Web later that year. I remember the
    teacher asking if anyone had read it yet. Nobody had. Little Miss KL
    did, however, shoot her hand into the air excited to be able to exclaim
    to everyone that she already owned a copy. Much to the praise for the
    teacher and her cool friends."Well, I guess that on the day, she might have expected some cool stuff…however, in the end, she seemed to have remembered the book anyway. Regardless of whether she has read it before class or not, I would have taken this action and interpreted it that she actually acknowledged the gift. And that's the positive thing about it. ;-)Besides, Charlotte's Web is a great book!

  3. I discovered it through the first movie which was a cartoon *sob* and at the time I had a pet pig who was gona die 🙁

  4. My kids are watching the movie. Right now, over and over today. It reminded me I never got back to reply to this post.I remember all those kinds of experiences growing up, not quite the same, but not so different. I was not cool , or popular, and more than wanting to be, I wanted a friend who understood the world inside my imagination, the place I spent so much time. It was years before I met those people who I could connect with on that kind of level, who understood that place of dreams and imagination. It was well worth the wait to find them.

  5. Y’know Jen? I’m not even sure whether she like the story itself or not. It was the fact that all I was able to get her was a book, which just so happened to be Charlotte’s Web, that made her react the way she did.I don’t even really remember the story. I vaguely recall not liking it but I think that was more due to the lovely life-lesson I now associate with the book.For most everything I’m beyond letting this part of my past bother me. It just feels like it’s hardwired in now. I react strongly to certain situations (rarely but still) that whip me back to that memory and my brain completely fetals on me.

  6. Thanks, Elellanyar Rilmavilyawa… as an adult who is more mature that my seven-year-old counterpart, I can appreciate what you’re saying. I’ve forgiven her now… we’re both adults. At the same time though, the event felt completely debilitating and had lasting effects.I’m starting to think I should reread the book…;^)

  7. Sorry to hear about the pig, David. That’s not a fun introduction to the story at all. I never actually saw any of the movie versions. Was the cartoon version any good?Thanks for commenting. I could have sworn I had add you to my neighbourhood but wasn’t sure why your post weren’t showing up.Added!

  8. Jared… I’m just going to start off by saying I love you too, friend. I miss ya.I really appreciate the kind words. And, yeah (so you don’t get too worried about me and tehese posts) overall I’m quite happy with the person I’ve become. Really happy, actually. It’s just that this happened to be one of those moments that affect you for the rest of your life. Y’know?It’s kinda funny because, although I understand what you’re saying, I’m the opposite. I just wished I were a bit cooler — or at least a bit stronger willed — to have not been so affected by that event.

  9. I spent many-a-moment alone with my imagination too. I wish I didn’t obsess so much over things I couldn’t control and just be more content with who I was. I would have enjoyed being in my own head a lot more.

  10. It's okay steelie, and yes that version was amazing!

  11. I think it (the obsessiveness) probably comes and goes with out you realizing you haven't been thinking about it much until you are thinking about it again. I also think kids bring a lot of those memories up, you think about them and worry about them and its normal to associate your worry for their mental, emotional and physical wellbeing to your past. One of my boys gets deeply attached to stuff. like I do. and its hard for me to tell him sometimes its just stuff, if it breaks and is not fixable we need to throw it out. At the same time I feel for him, I could never throw away a stuffed animal, they where friends, not toys, I even rotated them in the box so no one was always stuck at the bottom.

  12. Steelie, this is the most poignant and heart wrenching thing I've read in a while. Thank you. I know that sounds crazy but it has such an impact coming from you — a person who I feel I know so well and yet in many ways know so little about. The thing is, I *sooo* can identify with this story although my crushing feelings came from different sets of experiences in my younger years. I too struggled to find my place all through grade and even into high school. We didn't have a lot of money and so I was burdened with the consciousness that no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't appear to be like "them" — the cool people, the artificial products of the latest trends in both style and attitude. It was heart breaking, crushing, self-esteem bashing. And yet I (probably) wouldn't change my childhood for the world. The thing that separates "them" from people like you is integrity — despite your strong desire to be someone else, you clearly knew all along that you were and could only be you. I expect it's been a long battle but you've come out on the other side a more self-aware person. One of the things I really appreciate about you (especially because you're a fellah) is that you have this deep compassion for others, especially the underdog. That kind of compassion if not empathy is so rare and soooo incredibly valuable in the adult world. In kid territory it's just misunderstood and abused, often ridiculed. But in hindsight it's probably what made your childhood so difficult and yet is one of your most precious gifts. I know for sure that you've now achieved your status of "Wow, I want to be like him." L is a testament to that… I think it's so à propos that Charlotte's Web is the object of this story. I adored that book mostly because it was about finding inner strength and wisdom as well as selflessness. Sounds like that was the perfect gift for KL — something she could learn from…

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