Donny Robertson gave me my first Valentine. It was a cherry red, heart-shaped lollipop etched with white letters that read, “Be mine.”
In sixth grade, romantic gestures were like Big Foot sightings. We’d heard the stories, but no one had actually seen them. So I wasn't put off when he handed me the lollipop with an awkward shrug and said, "My mom packed this in my lunch. Do you want it?"
Donny's mother had packed him many treats over the years, Ding Dongs, Devil Dogs, Yankee doodles, and cool ranch Doritos. I had lusted after his lunch snacks all year. But He had never offered me any of those. So when he handed me this Valentine, my first real Valentine, pretending that it meant nothing, I froze. It was a snapshot, an out-of-body experience, and somehow I knew, and I knew that he knew, and all that unspoken knowing made my heart swell.
Donny had a sharp, swift, and slightly raunchy sense of humor, especially for a 6th grader. Word on the street was that he had spent some time in public school and got tainted by those "pagan" kids. Well, it paid off. He was not scared, safe, or stunted. He was a real live boy. Whose blue humor made me laugh. That honking, toothy, and overexposed laughter that would have surely been stifled if I had grown up with selfies, Facebook, Instagram, and Zoom. But in the days before social media, I was free to laugh my ugly, awkward laugh, and his humor won my heart.
At home, my mother was losing a bitter battle with breast cancer. So amid this nightmare, Donny's kindness and off-color jokes were a daily vacation from hell. I never believed that Donny, the cool, popular kid, had a thing for me. He was loud and charismatic, and I was skittish, shy, and slow on the uptake.
Two years later, his admiration was confirmed. The eighth-grade dance was a big deal. When I first got there, I wasn't sure why. The event took place in our school gymnasium. We all stood around looking at each other the same way we did in gym class, but this time dressed in our Sunday best, under lowlights, and to the soundtrack of 80's love songs. The girls clumped in bunches, and the boys hung around the circumference of the dance floor, rocking from side to side and pecking their heads to the drum solos.
As the night unfolded, we got more comfortable. After a particularly energetic and sweaty song, I went to the girl's room to wipe my face and was shocked to hear,
"Donny Robertson likes Maureen?" It came from a group of popular girls, delivered with disgusted disbelief like they had discovered a turd in the toilet. Maureen? Gross! Even I was shocked.
On the dance floor, Donny approached me, took my hands, and started to dance. It was the type of dance where you swung each other around, spinning out, spinning in, rocking back and forth, all with minimal eye contact. In the rare moment when I caught his glance, I wondered if my eyes were as animated and enthusiastically lit as his.
And under the blaring music and mood lighting, everyone else faded into nothingness, and all that was left was the bold, beautiful boy and the awkward and unsuspecting girl. Their bodies twirled, tucked, and twisted in what felt like a pre-choreographed movement like we had been born for this. moment.
Every once in a while, I would catch sight of his sparkling blue eyes, sweaty dark hair, and pirate’s smile bursting with mischief and possibilities.
The day after our graduation, Donny approached me again.
"I am having a party back at my house, and everyone is going. Do you want to come too?" Again, he shrugged like this was all normal like we had done this a thousand times before.
I showed up in a floral sundress and Candes high heels. Sandra Dee from the knees up and Sandy from the ankles down. I was still on the vine and hadn't yet fully ripened.
At the party, the other girls spoke too loud and fast and laughed too hard. They grabbed each other and huddled in hives of whispers that would erupt in volcanic screams. If I stood too close, I'd be a casualty of their hot gossip.
I felt myself shutting down. I found a chair in the hallway and put myself in time-out. I needed to be still; I had no words for what would later be called social anxiety.
After a while, Donny found me and asked why I was sitting alone. I shrugged. So he sat, we talked, and he made me laugh again. It felt like a rescue, a reassurance. A reassurance I didn’t know I needed.
After eighth grade, I went to an all-girls private school, and Donny went to the local public high school. In the spring of my freshman year, my mother transitioned, and life changed forever. I never saw Donny after his house party. But I never forgot his kindness and beauty.
On September 11th, I watched with the world as the unimaginable happened. And then it happened again. And then, thanks to the news machine, it happened over and over until we couldn’t watch it anymore.
On September 12th, my brother Jimmy, another young man with enthusiastic eyes, would get a call. He and his firehouse were being called over.
Those were my sister’s words, "Jimmy got called over." I knew what it meant. He was headed to ground zero to help dig through the death and ruble.
My sisters also shared that when our kid brother arrived at the barge that would shuttle them to the site, Jimmy and his team pushed to the front of the line. When he met up with the Captain in charge, Jimmy informed him that his team should go first.
The Captain asked why, and with the confidence of a motherless Jersey boy, Jimmy explained, "Cause my guys are the best."
My brother, along with a tribe of thousands of first responders, would step into hell.
His team was responsible for digging things out. The instructions were that if they came across any paraphernalia that was cop or fireman-related, a helmet, a badge, or a belt buckle, they were to halt the work and call over the foreman. Who would decipher what unit it belonged to, and those men and women from that unity would carry out the remains of their co-workers. There was a code of order amid the chaos, a raw ritual punctuating the confusion.
My brother would carry many things out to be assessed by the foreman and many stories back to us. Most of these stories we wished he didn't share and hadn’t seen. Then came the day he carried a story that would change my relationship with the fallen towers.
"Hey, Maureen, you know who worked on the 105th floor of the North Tower?"
"Who?"
"Donny, remember Donny Robertson?"
At that moment, I saw the building fall one last time, as though it was the first time, all over again.
Donny was 35; the newspaper said, "His family and friends were the most important thing to him in the world. He told the jokes, picked up the tab, and called the car service. If you were his friend, he'd ensure that he cared for you. There was a loyalty that went almost beyond friendship."
When I read those words, I know exactly what they're talking about.
The article said that he had a wife and four kids and that it was hard to find a photograph of Donny for the prayer card for his memorial Mass. There were no pictures of him without a child climbing on him. The family had to crop him out of a family reunion shot to get a photo without a small arm or leg draped around him.
Mr. Robertson could always be found with a smile on his face and ready to offer an encouraging word. Yes, I thought as I read the words, they got it; they saw him too.
Twice a year, I think of him, on September 11th and Valentine's Day. I think of us. Two scrappy, enthusiastic dancers twirling each other around the gymnasium.
I think of how that relationship gently crept into my life and slowly faded out, hovering only long enough to help me through a particularly rough patch.
And each year, when making my way through the candy isles at Walgreens, my eyes inevitably fall on the bag of those heart-shaped lollipops with the white writing that says, Be Mine.
All these years later, my heart still dropped a little because although it could have been passed off as a casual crush, in the grand scheme of things, the courage it takes for a 6th-grade boy to offer a valentine to a gratefully awkward young girl is the same courage it takes to do all the good stuff that life would have us do. Even the small stuff that you want to pass off as nothing.
I knew, and I knew that he knew, that it really meant everything.
In honor of love, do something brave today. Like sign up for dance class, write a love note, or subscribe to your favorite writer’s substack. :-)
Love, Maur
SHOP
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Dessert
These are a few images that bring me happiness. My husband’s unconditional love for our son. Our daughter’s love for art. My love for hot chocolate and awesome dance moves. Love comes in all forms and flavors. Love, Maur
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