shake your bon bon

from weheartit.com

Once upon a time--third through seventh grades, to be exact--I was in love with a swivel-hipped singer named Ricky Martin. Remember him? I wanted to be the one making him take his clothes off and go dancing in the rain. Figuratively speaking, of course; I was only nine years old. Who do you think I am?

I had a poster of him in my bedroom, and, if my memory serves me well, I'm fairly certain that I practiced kissing on it. Typical. His face was just so tan and...well, symmetrical. Of course, I moved on to other, slightly more real crushes, and that poster is probably crumpled up somewhere in one of the many memory boxes I have in the storage closet. Also, it turns out Ricky Martin is quite gay. Story of my life, really, but it just allowed me to move on faster since I knew that now there really was no chance we'd ever be together.

Fast forward ten years or so. One sunny September Saturday, I walk into work and who is seated at a table by the window but Señor Ricky Martin himself. A little scruffy, with mirrored aviators on, but still, unmistakably, that tan, symmetrical face. One of my childhood idols, in the flesh, mere inches away. Sitting, unaware of the flood of emotions coursing through my body. Nostalgia. Breathless anticipation. An uncontrollable urge to laugh, both at myself and at how utterly ridiculous life is sometimes.

As Sir Arthur Conan Doyle once said:

"Life is infinitely stranger
than anything the mind could invent."