The Weirdness of My First Love!

Fandango asked us for the Fandango Dog Days of August Challenge to share a story, a poem, a photo, a drawing, some music, or whatever to share about our first love. Here is my story.

There was a guy in my school that I thought was the best thing since cornbread! I so wanted to be his girlfriend, but I was an outcast at school, saddled with the ugly name of “Little Monster!” Because he lived on the “good” side of town and I lived on the “other” side of town, I felt that he would never want to connect himself with me, so I chose to love him from a distance, or, more to the point, on the telephone.

I called his house one night, having looked up his parents’ name in the White Pages. I asked to speak to him, and he came to the phone. When he asked who was calling, I told him that I was his secret admirer and that I had good reasons to want to stay incognito, and he was perfectly accepting of my request. We talked for about an hour on topics that we both liked, mostly books we’d read and science, subjects we both enjoyed at school.

For a whole school year, I called him each night, and we would talk for hours. I would pretend as if we were in the same room. We laughed and had great conversations, as we liked a lot of the same things and we were both introverts.

He would tell me all of his problems, at home and at school, and I would commiserate and let him know that he was valuable and such a good person. Just the fact that he talked each night to a stranger who remained nameless and faceless spoke of his compassionate nature.

I was a junior and he was a senior, so when he went away to college, for he was from the side of town where parents sent their chidlren to college, I envied him and I missed him. We spoke one last night, and he never asked me to identify myself. I had told him that I needed the friendship, and that if he knew who I was, he wouldn’t continue to talk to me. And even though he said that he would like me no matter what, I knew better.

I told him that the summer before, I had spent time with a young man that I had thought really liked me, but when we returned to school, he wouldn’t look at me in the hallways or speak to me, even if he was alone when he passed me. I couldn’t bear that rejection again. So, he understood and we just enjoyed those conversations, some of the best I have ever had.

Recently, I found out that he became a doctor in my hometown, and I am not surprised. He was super smart and amazingly kind. With caller id, this kind of story couldn’t happen today. But, I am so thankful for that year when I had someone to connect with each night and a reason to get excited each day that there was someone “out there” who was anticipating my call.

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