Legos and Apple Juice

Annie Hallinan

Class of 2024

__________

The little boy’s idea of heaven was new Lego toy sets and apple juice at every meal. The same boy’s idea of heaven 10 years later is a college acceptance letter on a glowing MacBook screen. At 8 and 18, one thing remained the same: no matter what the circumstances, the boy could always find the things he loved tucked away somewhere.

The little boy spent his younger years building up a life worth living. As he did with the Lego toy sets, he dedicated time and attention to making sure all the right pieces—color coded, ribbed with little round bumps—fit in all the right places. He was deliberate in clicking the pieces together; with every click, the Legos indicated that the boy did something right. So he followed every direction closely and paid no attention to any creative plan that might turn a perfect structure into a jumbled, unstable construction. Throughout the years, he collected his Legos and set them on a window sill above his desk: neatly-spaced, largest to smallest, out of reach to anyone but himself. When the summer sun shone through the window and onto the Legos, they became sun-bleached. But, the boy loved this depreciation because he knew God was looking over his Legos and giving them a warm, heavenly hug.

The boy’s favorite Lego set of all was the yellow airplane. It came in a simple, pale blue box. It took him three afternoons to build, and once he was done, he angled the plane upwards and made a low rumbling noise coupled with a slight shake of the aircraft. He could fly anywhere he wanted; he could go to Georgia, Tennessee, or even Texas.

Neither his knack for Legos nor his love for apple juice (the drink of toddlers, not of 18-year-old boys) simmered as he grew older. To most, juice is just juice. It’s nothing special. But to the boy, the stickiness of his favorite drink reminded him of his senior year of high school. If he poured the bronzey-gold liquid into a glass correctly, making no mistakes, everything stayed clean and dry. Unstuck. But if he spilled a little bit, if he messed up, then the juice dried on his keyboard and attached his pale fingers to anything he’d touch. Stuck. Regardless, the boy learned to embrace both sides. Sure, the stuck side of things drained him faster than the rate at which the juice left the glass and cost more than one thousand jugs of Mott’s, but how could he know the joys of being unstuck without ever being stuck?

In January, his official acceptance letter arrived. So he stuck the tri-fold piece of paper to the board above his desk with an old blue pushpin. “Dear John, Congratulations! I am pleased to offer you admission to the University of Texas at Austin.”