A Little Gift with Big Meaning...

Well, true to my blog title, I've been thinking about it too much.  It, being this, my second post.  I gave myself a bit of a pat on the back for starting the blog, but then I got cold feet again.  I seem to always be thinking of topics to write about, and that is rather exhilarating!  Then I'll start drafting my posts as an internal dialogue, and before I can even get ideas down on paper or onto the computer, I start "grading" them with an imaginary red pen.  Then it dawns on my that I still have a lot to learn about blogging itself, and even with the simple set up of the page.  Those things together combine, and the result is me not posting.  SO, in trying to overcome my own obstacles, I'm just going to sit down here and GO with what is on my mind right now!

I'm the kind of person that when I find a gift that I really want to give to someone, or if I know I found something that the recipient will love, I can't wait to give it to them!  I have a tendency to give my husband gifts well before Christmas or our anniversary just because I'm so excited to give it to him.  It also doesn't help that he is rather difficult to buy for, and doesn't want or need much.  So when I come up with something good, I can't wait.  Tonight was one of those nights.

Some background to the story is necessary here.  My husband and I met in college when we both in the University of Minnesota Marching Band.  I was a flag, he was a trombone.  He was actually one of the very first people I met when I went off to school and started in band.  Anyway, he and some of our friends in the bone section had these little Legomen on their trombones.  You know, Legos from when we were kids, the little figures.  Why they did this, I have no clue (nor does my husband!).  It was just something silly and funny.  I remember I was given a Legoman by one of them, and I was the only non-trombone to get one.  Mine even had a flag in his hand.  I felt so cool.  Ha!  :)  Well, my then friend Alec, had a Lego pig he named Kool Mo Pig.  Kool Mo was well-known and you didn't mess with or dis the pig.  :)

(my flag Legoman!)

On a Gopher football gameday, we did a typical march around the outside of the Dome (the Minneapolis, Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome).  No one seems to know why, but Kool Mo was getting tossed around the bone section.  (Yeah, not bright to begin with.)  And of course, what happened?  What you'd expect.  Someone in the section, who shall remain nameless, dropped Kool Mo.  To look for him would have meant stopping the whole marching band, and that would be like trying to stop a rushing herd.  It wasn't going to happen.  Kool Mo was gone.  Now keep in mind, this was the fall of 1994 I believe, and to this present day, Kool Mo, and the loss of him still gets talked about!  

For years I had told myself I'd search eBay and find Alec a replacement Kool Mo.  It was one of those passing monment thoughts.  I'd think it, and then forget it for a long time, or just put it off.  Just this week, I searched eBay, and found one!  I clicked the "buy it now" button without even batting an eye.  He arrived in the mail just two days ago, and I couldn't help but smile when I opened the envelope.  I set Kool Mo 2 aside and was going to decide later when to present him to Alec.  Maybe for Christmas, maybe for our upcoming anniversary, or maybe even at the start of the U's homecoming which is next week.  But Alec came home from work today kinda punchy, and he admitted he was feeling annoyed.  We talked throughout dinner and he was most annoyed at the fact he was annoyed and wasn't able to let it go.  I knew this was a perfect time to present Kool Mo 2.

I told him I had a little present for him, and he gave me this confused look and asked why.  I said that I had something I wanted to give him, and this might make him happy.  I asked him to sit on the couch, close his eyes and hold out his hand.  Now I have known Alec for 20 years, and I've given him a lot of gifts in that time.  But the smile on his face when I told him to open his eyes and he saw Kool Mo 2, was priceless!  I haven't seen that kind of smile on him in a long time.  You all know that smile.  The one of a simple, pure joy.  Not even giving him an F-150 would bring a smile like that.  That little plastic pig brings back so many great memories, but now it's more than just that.  It's what it symbolizes and represents - our college days, the best times of our lives, some easier, simpler, and dare I say, more fun times!      

So now, Kool Mo 2 can sit on a shelf in our family room with my Legoman, and in a small, childlike way, it's like all is right in our little the world again.  Alec has a little piece of his past back, and like I had hoped, his mood totally improved!

(Kool Mo 2!)

What little thing, or toy, would make you light up?  What little thing or toy would make someone you care about light up?  It's a fun thing to think about!  So I hope you do, and that you come up with your own Kool Mo 2 type of gift for someone in your life!  I think we all need something simple, and little to bring some joy into this crazy life.

I still haven't come up with a cool sign-off.  So in the meantime here, I'll say...

Until next time (and it won't take me as long as it did this time!)...