A couple months ago, I was shopping at Pandora and a saleslady had approached me to ask if I was looking for anything in particular. If you know me, you know I hate shopping and I only go into stores if I know exactly what I want. I told her the ring I wanted, the size I needed and proceeded to pull out my credit card. She looked at me and says, “You don’t remember me, do you?” I said “Oh, do we know each other?” She said her name was Nicki (Not her real name) and told me that I was her ‘big sister’ when she was in Grade 5. She had gotten a lot taller and her hair was dyed orange. She asked me if I remembered the pictures I drew for her and how we were both obsessed with cupcakes. We started to chat more about what brought us here and things started to click; I remembered Nicki but I couldn’t recall any of the conversations we had.
When I was in high school, I participated in the Big Brother Big Sister program. This program partnered me up with a girl who struggled both academically and socially. I wasn’t given a lot of background on her and was just told be a ‘big sister’. I had no clue what that meant so I just helped her with her homework and played card games. I was only in grade 11 and I figured a program like this might help me decide if I wanted to pursue a career in teaching. At first I tried to fill the air with small talk (which I still suck at) but as we both got more comfortable, I got to know Nicki not as a student but as this funny sweet girl who just wanted to fit in. We hung out once a week to talk about boys and what was new in the Neopets world.
I find it extremely awkward to tell myself I make good first impressions or at least memorable ones because I always cruised along the line of mediocre. I was the person that hid from the limelight and only appeared on a need to know basis. But it was moments like this that really made think man, all we did was play checkers and she remembered me. Sometimes that’s all it takes.
