“Winter
must be cold for those with no warm memories” (An Affair to Remember)
It was the first day of winter
today. The first day in November a chill filled the air. So cold you bypass the
shadows and head straight for the sunlight paths. But it was there among the
cold I walked alone.
I was running errands and getting
swept away by the Monday Blues. I made it to my car finally and got in as
quickly as possible. I burred loudly as an alert flashed the screen on my
phone. I looked down and realized my calendar was alerting me of birthdays and
such. I scrolled down and I saw his name.
I found it strange that I still held
this information after so many years. Even more surprised when I realized it
was in some way comforting. And in that car alone, on the first day of winter,
with a chill in the air… I felt warmth.
I was only 15 when I met him. I was Cinderella
at the ball when I met him, and he was the prince who found my lost slipper.
I remember it well. I was sitting
down when he walked in to the skating ring. I’d just suffer a hard fall and was
trying to recuperate. A bit embarrassed I was taking my skates off when he came
over. He’d recognize a mutual friend sitting next to me and wanted to say
hello. He had a smile on his face when he introduced himself to me. He asked me
what I was doing. And I said that I was quitting.
He laughed and said “Don’t do that.
Come on, come with me. I promise, don’t worry, I’ll be there to catch you if
you fall.” He extended his hand and I took it.
He was a stranger. But as I took his
hand and proceeded to skate with him side by side I forgot all about it. He was
charming, and witty, and terribly sweet. It felt safe, and warm, and right.
So we skated the rest of the night,
and when the night ended we said goodbye. Sadly, neither one of us thought of
asking the other for each other’s number. And yet somehow, I knew I’d see him
again someday.
Months passed before I ever did. It
was at a convention. I was about to take a step down the stairs when something
made me turn left. And there he was. Dressed in a suit, and enchanting smile,
just a couple feet away from me. Our eyes met, and we both swiftly moved
towards each other. Needless to say, when the convention was over he asked for
my number then. The rest as they say was history. Beautiful, first love,
enchanting history.
We invested 5 years into each other.
We loved foolishly and sometimes blindly the way first loves are often lived.
It wasn’t a perfect love. It was after all my first. It was full of mistakes,
much on my end for being so young. Full of emotions and ultimatums.
Expectation is what ruins first
loves, and it did ours. I’d expected love to be a certain way, having it been
engraved in me when it didn’t pan out the way I planned it, it felt like the
sky was falling. But he never wavered. He loved me unconditionally. So
beautifully that I couldn’t help but keep coming back to him.
The magic of first loves is our
ignorance that it can never end. But they do. Because at that age, butterflies
never lie still long enough. We parted ways at the end of those 5 years, and
moved on with our lives.
I loved him dearly, and I know he
loved me very much. But sometimes all the love in the world won’t save a
sinking ship. Sometimes you just have to jump over board. And though till this
day it warms my heart when I see him, an ending was an ending. No matter how
many pages of beautifully written stories led up to it, it would always have
the last word.
It’s been many years since then,
time and distance created an inevitable gap, and needless to say we both
ventured off into different territories. But even so sometimes I can still
close my eyes and hear him say “Don’t you worry, I’ll be there to catch you if
you fall”. And it still warms my heart.
So maybe I never really got
Cinderella’s ending. Maybe in the process the glass slipper broke, but the
story well that lives on forever. When I recant the story, I realize how
terribly fortunate I was for having had an almost perfect first love. It set
the standard pretty high thereafter. And left me a bit of an optimist when it
comes to love.
I don’t know where he is in life,
strangely enough. But wherever he is I wish him well, and happiness, and lots
and lots of love because he deserves it. I adore him still, and always will,
after all no one forgets their first love. I have only fond memories. Sweet
rose colored memories. And I always will.
Some people in your life create that
kind of impact. That inevitable mark in your heart that leaves you changed
forever. Making you forever indebted with them for helping shape you. And
thanks to him I learned what love is.
Sarah Dessen once wrote: “Some things don’t last forever, but some
things do. Like a good song, or a good book, or a good memory you can take out
and unfold in your darkest times, pressing down on the corners and peering in
close, hoping you still recognize the person you see there.”
And it’s true. Winter may be cold
and bitter, and you might burr in desperation at times when it comes to love,
but warm memories, well they stay with you forever. And they give you hope in
despair. They remind you that if all else fails, eventually, spring will come.
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