Memories of First Love
Dec. 22nd, 2003 01:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
talktoolooseHaving teased you dramatically yesterday about finding my first love on the web, I'll reprint an entry I wrote about him in another blog identity two years ago. Please note: Snake's pseudonym at the time was Attilla, one of my favourite Hungarian names.
2001-04-17 - 8:38 p.m.
Today, I was remembering my first love. We were 18, he was straight (I think) and I thought I was too. Really, he's more of an "in retrospect" first love, and there will be no breathless consummation to this tale. Strangely enough, he was Hungarian, just like Attilla; or at least born to Hungarian parents in Canada.
My teenage dreamboat and I discovered each other in senior year of high school. We had three classes together and somehow figured out that we were a couple of neat guys with dreams that went beyond the conventional. At 16, he had become the youngest person in Ontario's history to receive his pilot's license and, at 18, the youngest to receive his commercial rating. You see, he wanted to be an astronaut. And unlike other little boys who dream of space travel at age 10, he actually took steps to get there. He was on his way to military college the following year to study aeronautical engineering.
Although he had a real butch energy, there was a delicious, gentle twinkle in him. For example, whenever he'd see a baby, he'd squeel "Babeeeee!" in a high-pitched voice and go over to the carriage to coo. He was short and powerful and had a jaw like a movie star. I stared at that jaw a lot.
I don't know how he discovered me. I spent my high school years trying to be as neutral as possible. I hung out with friends at school, but attended no parties and no dances. I dated no one and, in general, did nothing that would allow anyone too near, lest they sniff out the horrible stench of fagdom that I knew (though denied) was hiding in my ripe loins. (Ripe loins? Hello, Harlequin?)
But by spring of that year (1982!), I was seriously in love and he was glad to be my friend. Then the most romantic event of my life happened. It was a perfect day at the end of May, a week or so before final exams. We were walking to Functions and Relations (oh, sweet irony!) when Flyboy said to me, "It's too nice to go to math class, isn't it?" And with that, we left the school, hopped into his beaten up Chevy and drove to Buttonville airport where he rented out a two-person Cessna, and took me up into the clouds.
He praised my poise as the little plane jumped and dipped in the turbulence. He flew me over downtown and the University of Toronto which I would attend in the fall. We were free. Life lay ahead of us and we were men, not high school kids. And I wasn't just a scared closet-boy who didn't deserve to be loved; I was the friend he had chosen to fly with. I didn't know what I had done to deserve such happiness, but happy I was. Nineteen years later, I'm still smiling and choked up and vividly there beside him in the noisy cabin of the Cessna.
And that's all. He went his way, and I went mine. We saw each other for a weekend the following September, again at Commencement in November, and one final afternoon in January. That last time, we went to see the movie 48 Hours, and I came out livid at the testosterone-soaked audience who cheered some real tragic violence in the story. I ranted afterwards, my newly acquired beard unkempt like a revolutionary hero's. And he had no response. They don't question gratuitous violence at military college. I blamed my self-righteous expressions of rage for the fact that we didn't get together again; but really, I think it was just circumstance and the unpredictable currents of life.
I've watched the papers carefully. Marc Garneau was Canada's first astronaut. Julie Payette and others followed, but his name has not appeared. There are a few people on Yahoo People Search who share his name, none in Canada, one in Tampa, Florida. I haven't written yet.
What would my letter say?
"I still dream about you."
2001-04-17 - 8:38 p.m.
Today, I was remembering my first love. We were 18, he was straight (I think) and I thought I was too. Really, he's more of an "in retrospect" first love, and there will be no breathless consummation to this tale. Strangely enough, he was Hungarian, just like Attilla; or at least born to Hungarian parents in Canada.
My teenage dreamboat and I discovered each other in senior year of high school. We had three classes together and somehow figured out that we were a couple of neat guys with dreams that went beyond the conventional. At 16, he had become the youngest person in Ontario's history to receive his pilot's license and, at 18, the youngest to receive his commercial rating. You see, he wanted to be an astronaut. And unlike other little boys who dream of space travel at age 10, he actually took steps to get there. He was on his way to military college the following year to study aeronautical engineering.
Although he had a real butch energy, there was a delicious, gentle twinkle in him. For example, whenever he'd see a baby, he'd squeel "Babeeeee!" in a high-pitched voice and go over to the carriage to coo. He was short and powerful and had a jaw like a movie star. I stared at that jaw a lot.
I don't know how he discovered me. I spent my high school years trying to be as neutral as possible. I hung out with friends at school, but attended no parties and no dances. I dated no one and, in general, did nothing that would allow anyone too near, lest they sniff out the horrible stench of fagdom that I knew (though denied) was hiding in my ripe loins. (Ripe loins? Hello, Harlequin?)
But by spring of that year (1982!), I was seriously in love and he was glad to be my friend. Then the most romantic event of my life happened. It was a perfect day at the end of May, a week or so before final exams. We were walking to Functions and Relations (oh, sweet irony!) when Flyboy said to me, "It's too nice to go to math class, isn't it?" And with that, we left the school, hopped into his beaten up Chevy and drove to Buttonville airport where he rented out a two-person Cessna, and took me up into the clouds.
He praised my poise as the little plane jumped and dipped in the turbulence. He flew me over downtown and the University of Toronto which I would attend in the fall. We were free. Life lay ahead of us and we were men, not high school kids. And I wasn't just a scared closet-boy who didn't deserve to be loved; I was the friend he had chosen to fly with. I didn't know what I had done to deserve such happiness, but happy I was. Nineteen years later, I'm still smiling and choked up and vividly there beside him in the noisy cabin of the Cessna.
And that's all. He went his way, and I went mine. We saw each other for a weekend the following September, again at Commencement in November, and one final afternoon in January. That last time, we went to see the movie 48 Hours, and I came out livid at the testosterone-soaked audience who cheered some real tragic violence in the story. I ranted afterwards, my newly acquired beard unkempt like a revolutionary hero's. And he had no response. They don't question gratuitous violence at military college. I blamed my self-righteous expressions of rage for the fact that we didn't get together again; but really, I think it was just circumstance and the unpredictable currents of life.
I've watched the papers carefully. Marc Garneau was Canada's first astronaut. Julie Payette and others followed, but his name has not appeared. There are a few people on Yahoo People Search who share his name, none in Canada, one in Tampa, Florida. I haven't written yet.
What would my letter say?
"I still dream about you."
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no subject
Date: 2004-01-02 07:51 pm (UTC)Well, I will need to be brief and explain 2 first loves...one was a woman and one was a man. And in both cases, I didn't experience it until college.
For the woman, she was one of my best friends. Although we never formally dates, and I judged all of her boyfriends, at one time, we thought about being serious together and trying out a relationship and seeing how it worked. She wasn't one of those girls who tries to "convert" gay people...but her and I truly had a connection deeper than friendship, more spiritual than religion. We could finish each other sentences. We could invite each other over for dinner and know without asking what the other person wanted to eat that day. We would often show up to each other places with something to cheer the other person up. It was a love greater than friendship, but not quite a relationship. In the end, we both agreed that she didn't want to sleep to with a gay man no more than I wanted to sleep with a women. But until this day, people had us pegged to marry we were just that much of a couple. We kissed and made out a couple of times, and I was astonished that I found her beautiful physiologically and sexually. Probably one of a few women I will ever say that about.
My first love in college introduced me to the "gay world", meaning clubs and bars and stuff. Most people knew I was gay, and during my freshman year at the school I eventually transferred from, the environment was so safe and comfortable that one could be gay and open and feel okay about it. You didn't have a need to fear of getting beat up. He and I had a very secret relationship, but it had more to do with race than with sexual orientation. His parents were very racist and prejudiced, and in the end, he wasn't strong enough to stand up to them (I think I come from a relatively good home and have a solid education behind me). So towards the middle of the spring semester, I felt I had to give him a choice to stand up to his parents or that we would have to seperate. We talked about it, and in the end we seperated. I would like to say that the logic of a 18 year old is perfect and makes sense, but that's not always the case. I found it difficult to hate him or be mad at him, because he also had to look out for his own interests (the college i went to my freshman year was US$28,000.....and that was 1995). So we are still friends...we chat occasionally. He finally found the courage to stand up to his parents after he graduated (even though his boyfriend is white...he just felt "he owed it to me and himself" in his words). But he'll forever remain my first love. He didn't even take my virginity, but the physical and emotional love for him is still very much there. Although I wouldn't act on it today (and it has nothing to do with the fact that I have a boyfriend now...it's just more to do with I want to preserve the memory), I still love him alot and do tend to keep in contact with him.
So there are my love stories...pretty lame, eh?
no subject
Date: 2004-01-06 09:45 am (UTC)Thank you for sharing these stories.
TTL