The best offer I ever refused: When I was in high school, a man 12 years my senior proposed to me in a Tim Hortons. We were not dating or otherwise romantically involved (although I may have been schtupping his best friend). His ex-fiancee-turned-lesbian was squatting in his house and refusing to vacate. His life was a mess and apparently I could turn things around for him. I had no idea how to respond to such a question, but I found the strength to break his heart. I was never in any danger of accepting, but I sometimes like to wonder how different my life would be if I had said yes.
The best gift I ever gave: Hm. Well, I made my mother-in-law cry when I gave her a scrapbook about her son. I made my friend cry when I gave her a baggie full of pre-rolled joints. I made my mother furrow her brow when I gave her a hand-painted toilet seat. But I think the best would be the night Jason walked me to my class (criminology) and before slipping in the hall, I handed him a card. It wasn't a special occasion, but the card told him that gifts awaited him under the bed, and to open the big one first. It was the highly coveted PS2 which he hadn't even dreamed of getting his hands on, along with several games to get him started. I put beer and treats in the fridge and left a note to call his friends and not to bother picking me up from class - I knew he'd be busy. By the time I got home that night, he already had a serious callous going, but he still paused the game to give me a hug.
The best lie I ever told: I don't know how my bra got in his car.
The best skirt I ever misplaced: It was a black Tommy Hilfiger mini skirt, and my sister bought it for me a size too big so it hung on my hips instead of my waist. I loved that skirt. It prompted one boy to observe you wear the shortest skirts of anyone I know (though I was actually wearing a different one of decent length the day a man stopped me on the street and asked how much I charged for blowjobs). And then one day...poof. Well, okay, there was no poof. The vanishing was absurdly quiet. I held hope in my heart for months that it would be found alive and well, but it never was.
The best movie I never saw: Star Wars, hands down. Any of them. It really infuriates people.
The best funeral I ever crashed: I was 9, I think. Some old lady died. I didn't know her, but I was staying with my aunt and she took me into the bosom of grieving strangers and left me to my own devices. The family crowded around the corpse to pose for photographs. Some of them said cheese, others made attempts at solemnity. One little girl sat cross-legged on top of the coffin. I remember there being salmon sandwiches of a suspiciously vibrant pink colour cut into impossibly tiny triangles. I didn't eat them. Back at the house, a woman I didn't know said that "the kids" should go swimming, and she thrust at me a green bikini of unknown origins. It was too big and the pool was the last place I wanted to be, but I hadn't been given a choice. I stood on the diving board seething, and then leapt in feet first, somehow managing to lose my ballooning top in the process. I covered my baby boobies and tread water like crazy until someone I'd never seen before and luckily never saw again handed me a towel and I made my escape.
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