My First Love Lost
I will not say that he was the object of my first affections, for that would be a lie. I have been feeling passionate about people since I was very, very young. Younger probably than most people. But I deny giving those feelings the title of love.
This may seem unfair to those who don’t know the difference, but those who do will agree: calling infantile crushes love is calling a dandelion a rose. There is simply no comparison.
I suppose that we all lose our first loves, as well, and that is what makes them so sweet. But the truth is, real love is something that one never truly loses: as long as we hold onto that feeling, that emotion that is love, in its first, most pure state, we have hope, and we have the promise of bright days ahead. And your first love is perhaps your most real and most true of all loves.
It took us a year and a half to work up to “I love you,” even though we’d been saying it with our eyes for almost that entire time. He thought I was “hot,” I thought he was “cute,” his friends hated me for taking him, my friends hated me for talking about him all the time, but we were in love, and damn the rest of the world.
Every single important moment with him, from first kiss, first voicing of the tremendous feeling inside, first time making love, break up, was completely perfect. In the course of three months, I ran through every single passionate emotion a human being can possess. And I think that he would tell you the same.
Finally, I made a mistake or two, and it became apparent that he had many things to do that he couldn’t do with me there loving him deeply. I do not say that bitterly; it is the truth. We are both young and ignorant, and college draws us steadily farther away. And yet, our love draws us closer and closer together.
In the days that followed the breakup, I realized that while it hurt incredibly to have to “lose” him, I had gained him as a friend, and that was more important than anything else. Years down the line, I am sure, we will end up back together, for there is much unfinished business and untapped emotions between us.
But even if that never comes to pass, he is, and will always remain, my first love as well as one of my truest friends. There is so much I have to thank him for, and I cannot, so I merely show him in my actions how much he means to me, as a human being. I give him compassion, now, instead of passion.
Love, true love, transcends all. It does not have to be passionate. It does not have to be wild, it does not have to be romantic. True love is ALL of those things, at one time or another, but it endures through all the ups and downs, adapts to all situations, and never gives up. That is what gives those who love truly the incredible hope that all others find so amazing and foolish.
But those who love are not foolish … they are, for the first time, truly alive and open to feeling all emotions that can possibly be felt by the human soul.
I am not a fool to have loved and lost, for I lost nothing, and I gained the world.
