I was going to go through the hassle of putting a poll here in the post, but…..yeah, that didn’t happen. But I’m going to go out on a limb and speculate the most of you reading will fall into the same category as I.
The category that looks at question #10 {discuss your first love and first kiss} and thinks, '”but they are two separate entities.”
Am I right?
Because my first kiss was certainly not with my first love. I wish it had been; but, in fact, there were three “frogs” before I met my first “prince.”
So, I’m going to opt to forego the story of my first kiss. Because while I remember it in vivid detail that would make for a riveting story, it was with a boy that I’d rather it not have been, under circumstances that carry a good bit of shame, and I’d just as soon tell y’all about the sweet, rather than the bitter.
So….instead, I’m just going to tell you a little bit about my first love.
In the middle of my sophomore year of high school, I transferred from one small, private school in our town to another small, private school in our town, under circumstances that made it even more difficult than your average switch.
I, alone, had a “free period” during 6th hour, since I’d already completed the math course the rest of my class was taking, so I sat in on the junior’s chemistry class. And it was during that period that I got to observe him.
He was adorable, and just my type. Dark hair, blue eyes. About 6 feet tall. A captain on the soccer team. Popular, and funny, and available.
It wasn’t until the following school year that I realized he knew who I was, too, and in the fashion of small, private school romances, we went from a glance across the cafeteria (September 7) to a sweet Tommy-scented puppy on my sixteenth birthday (September 30) to an after-game-bus-“proposal” to be “his girl” (October 15) just like that.
And the rest is history. I had a storybook, fairy tale, sweet, innocent, pure high school romance. Each day, we’d exchange notes (sorry, Mr. Beaman and Mr. Hobbins) and by the end of the school year, I had a 3 ring binder of 250+ letters that could rival any Hallmark card out there. Every Thursday, he’d call me at 8:00 pm, and we’d talk until ER came on at 10:00. Each month, on the 15th, roses corresponding to the number of months we’d been together, appeared in my locker. After scoring the winning soccer goal that would take us to the state championship game, he dropped to his knees on the field, found my eyes on the sideline, and gestured “that was for you!”
He ate lunch with my every day; took me to see The Phantom of the Opera for Christmas; (almost) beat up one of his best friends after he (the friend) chased a loose basketball during a tournament and instead of catching the ball, slammed me (the unsuspecting cheerleader) into a door post, cracking my head open and giving me a concussion. He would pick me up for Friday night dates in the sports off-seasons and we’d go ice skating or double date to local pizzeria’s with his best friend and his girl or simple hang out at his house shooting baskets in the barn with his parents. He was sweet, attentive, romantic, sentimental….
Sidenote: The brand Adidas. Did you know it (supposedly) is an acronymn for “all day long I dream about soccer”? I didn’t. At least not until I questioned a banner he’d hung over his desk at home that read “adidam” and he simply explained, “All day long I dream about Monica.” Swoon.
He took me golfing for the first time. He took my little brother and his buddy to Cedar Point and helped them win this ridiculously ugly and HUGE stuffed alien. He held my hand as he turned his tassel on his graduation cap. (A tassel, I’ll admit, I still have and that is tucked away in my hope chest, nestled between my baby blanket and my mother’s wedding veil….)
And, because we both thought that I’d be right behind me a year later, we decided to break up during his freshman year of college. We didn’t want to do a long distance relationship, so we said we’d see each other at Christmas, and then, in the fall, after I’d graduated we’d pick back up where we’d left off.
And I cried myself to sleep after he called me on September 15 and told me how much he missed me and that this separation was harder than he’d expected. But the months ticked away, and I we were both focused on our grades, and by the time December came, and he was home from break, there’d been a shift.
We sat on the hood of my car one cold December night, and held hands, and cried, because…well, it was over. Nothing had happened. Neither of us had met someone else. Our romance had just come to an end. I have no doubt that as we sat there, we both would have said “I still love this person,” but we were both being realistic. I’d chosen a different school to attend in the fall, and he wasn’t even sure if he was going to go back to his college. So, that night, we sat there until we couldn’t feel our toes, and until there was nothing left to say, and then he hugged me, and I drove home.
And a few years later, he married one of my high school classmates that he’d known since he could walk, and I met Jim.
And in August of 2008, I saw him at my 10 year high school reunion, and it was awkward, because, hello, you have this incredible, whirlwind, fairytale at this amazing juncture of your life, and then a decade passes, and there you stand, across someone’s backyard, with your spouses and children looking on…..
He was, and is, an amazing guy. We are Facebook friends, and I’m still close to his parents, and his wife and I exchange the occasional email about parenting boys, since their son was born just a few days after Seth. (And get this, she and I were both on bedrest in the same hospital, at the same time, in December 2007. I know!)
And that’s the story of my first love. It was amazing, and it’s given me a perspective on high school dating that I’d never expected to have. If Erin is ever lucky enough to meet a young man like my high school sweetheart, I’ll whole heartedly give my blessing to her, even at 15/16. Because, yes, there can, and most likely will, be heartbreak, but I truly believe a love that sweet and simple and pure is worth every tear.
