Childhood Memories: The Passing Party Incident

A story in honor of Ike’s first school passing party.

1st grade. Ms. Phelps class. Christmas passing party.

My contribution was a travel sized version of “Guess Who?” Solid gift, right? Everyone loves guessing which bald guy with glasses the other person has.

So, we do the passing party thing, and I end up with a package of 3-4 toy tanks. I was never much into tanks, but I was content with the gift. They were going to make great bad guys to work with shredder against the ninja turtles.

Everything was going fine until the teacher came up to me. She whispered into my ear that another little boy was upset by the gift that landed on him.

Already, I’m thinking, “what does this have to do with me?”

She then says that the other little guy brought the tanks, so she was going to trade my gift for his. Not sure that’s the point of a passing part, but okay.

So, he gets his toy tanks back. And, me? I get…

KEDS SOCKS.

Anyone else from the 90’s remember these? They were long, warm socks that had the rubber on the bottom to keep you from slipping.

They sound awesome now. Not so much to 1st grade me.

And, as you can tell, I’m not still bitter about the whole experience decades later.