FIRST LOVE LOST

We feel many kinds of love in our lifetime. As we grow they grow with us or dim and fade.  I loved my new bike.  My mom.  The first snow of the year…But there is one love that most of us can never really get over – that’s our first romantic love. 

It started when our eyes met so briefly in the school cafeteria line a couple of months into the school year.  And wow!  There are thousands of words and songs about it – poets praise it in iambic pentameter.  But when it happens for the first time – there are no words that do it justice.  But we just know it.  

Indeed "Zing went the strings of my heart"....!  We got our food and she sat with her friends; me with mine.  One of her friends said something.  They laughed.  I tried not to look.  But I failed.  For the whole lunch period I took a quick glance at her and at my green plastic plate of school food.  I deposited most of my gray meatloaf in the can by the door. Somehow my - always great appetite - vanished. I felted afflicted with a malady.  And by the next day I noticed that the sky while waiting for the school bus  – nothing but blue skies did I see.  I kept hearing song lyrics in my head that seemed to be about me. In a daze I walked the hall of lockers hoping to see her.  And then there she was opening locker #214 – I still remember its number and what she was wearing.  A gray skirt, a blue oxford blouse and argyle knee socks.  I felt a bit dizzy - is this true love like the flu?  After two days of exchanging smiles. I had the courage to say “hi”.  And now knew her name - Kathy.  The day after I walked with her to her math class.  I was late to my Latin II torture.  I get a warning that lateness is not tolerated in Latin.  And unlike the former fearsome me I really didn't care.  

And so it progressed according to the ritual of a high school romance. Walking led to carrying books to holding hands to yearning to be together more each day.  We went on our first date.  We met at the movies on a Friday night, holding hands for GreyFriars Bobby – a sentimental perfect date movie - but were we both really watching?  I think we were both making our own movie.  Next Saturday we meet at the Y dance.  We kiss goodnight quickly and she runs to her dad’s car.  And our school days turn into months.  The intervals between seeing each seem so long.  The leaves fell and winter winds blew. But our love kept us warm.  Her dad gives her permission to drive with me on dates.  We explore places and each other.  What to buy her for Christmas?  Picking the right Valentine.  I give her a big chocolate Easter Egg…and then spring and school is almost over.

We say goodbye on the marble steps of our last day - an occasion we both once looked forward to  – but not now.  We would be miles apart and I had a summer job, saving for college - we could only connect during the week by phone.  The words flowed – mostly silly words.  We laughed and constantly tested each other.  Did she meet someone new at the shore?  Do you love me?  Do you still love me? Would you like to date other people?  Do you…would you…?  All games in the dance of first love.  We went to the beach on my days off and hugged under the blanket.  We crowded as much as we could into weekends.  And then  summer faded and she went back to high school and I left for college.  And by our homecoming at Thanksgiving.  I didn’t sit with her at the big game.  I told her I wanted to sit with my friends who I hadn’t seen for months.  She got mad. We argued and then it was over.

For some of us first love just ends as fast as it starts.  First loves are fragile.  An unkind word can lead to unraveling.  But for some of my former classmates their puppy love would last - it was real and went beyond school to marriage to children to homes and lives well lived!  I look back and still wonder, after all these years, why was I different?  I left home and would never came back.  I guess it was my yearning to get beyond the borders of our small town and taste a bigger world.  I look back now and wonder was it all really worth it?  I gained much in my life, some fame, family and some great times – but I paid for what I gained with the loss of my innocent dreams of romance.  Somewhere along the way the blues skies grayed and my love songs faded.  

I paid a price by saying goodbye to my first love - she made my heart sing a song it would never sing again.