"If you fall in love with another and he falls in love with you and then love chooses to leave, do not try to reclaim it or to assess blame. Let it go.", says Kent Nerburn from his book Letters to my Soul.
Reactions from love stories in movies, novels, comics and magazines, TV soap operas and radio programs are overwhelming especially when touching one's heart is at stake, well, at least for a short while. But nothing compares to the feeling of what love has to bring to you when you try and experience it yourself. Let me tell you about childhood and teenage stories that I had once told - what I did for love, how I managed to cope with the demands of love and eventually made me what I am now.
It hurts each time love has to go. Love has chosen me for many times in all my years of existence and many times love chose to leave. I do not know, and still asking, if my well being has got something to do with all of it. Like my being too friendly with other girls. Or my being not-too-jealous-type guy. Or perhaps I was just too loose or maybe too tight in a relationship that my partner and I could hardly breathe. Maybe...
LOVE AT FIRST TRY. Let me call her Lyn, the brightest star in the Narra section back then when I was still in sixth grade. Take note: sixth grade! Enchanted with her charm, captivated with swaying hips each time she was in the dance floor, I was always left wandering around restless yet so inspired. Friends called it puppy love. I called it childhood craze.
Dad never objected nor stopped me from developing such a feeling of hearts bursting out, full of motivation, mostly happening whenever she was a hand-reach away. She could be liken to a "supergirl" who brought magic and hope to a superhero who was about to lose a terrible fight. When everything seemed so dull, she was the light, so to speak. While other boys rejoiced at the news of a coming holiday or no class day, I stayed on a corner thinking of about anything to let the day not come or praying it would be canceled out totally. Those days, my prayers didn't work, in a way. So I had to content myself to seeing her picture, which she gave me in one of those morning music classes.
She was an inspiration to a young boy with a youthful heart. Whenever she wore that red flower-designed dress, I could not help but drool over her beauty that never seemed to fade. She was a choir member, and so was I. She was involved in the dance troupe, and I was too. With regards to our likes and dislikes, no question, we’re very much compatible.
Not all our classmates knew about so many things between us. Only those classified as close peers. Not even Mom. But when mom knew all about it, she gave me a dose of back-to-back motherly advice, enough to get me into thinking about the pros and cons of loving the opposite sex. Too late, it was. There was no need for someone to tell us the exact time and season for love, for one way or the other, we had discovered and learned the secrets on our own, at a very young age. One lesson was to enjoy childhood days, free from commitment and all-time promises. So, bounded by young ages, time had to move on for the two of us. Happy days had to go. After graduation, we parted ways and went to different schools. Though we talked at times, it was so hard for us to bring back the blissful moments again.
THE SECOND TRY. After more than a year of forgetting what happened on my first try, I told myself to let go of that 'love affair' thing and concentrate on what I was, in the first place, aiming for - to be on top of the honor list. Besides, love was a kind of diversion for the likes of me who run for books and novels rather than being with the gimmick gang after the last sound of the bell. But guess what, love wouldn't allow me to be inactive for a minute even: I was love-struck (again?) and love took hold of me in my most depressed time.
Ours began in friendship (how else would it be?). We were seatmates then. We shared things common friends do – notebooks, papers, snacks, even love notes and lines. She always had my books scripted with "Take Cares" at the back each time she would borrow and bring it at home. How sweet of her.
Time slowly nurtured both feelings inside us, that one afternoon, as we were about to go home, unexpectedly, we were made "more than just friends". As it never happened before, this time my heart pounded so differently. It was so far-out and awesome, more than just flying to the seventh heaven and being in cloud nine. It was inexpressible joy that as I trekked home (this is one good thing above love), everybody's face seemed to look like hers.
We lasted for a year though. We both decided to give a little space for other things and spare much of our time for studies. "We're too young for this and there is still more room for love", she said as I had my last kiss. It pays off at the end. I graduated with honors, as I dreamed of. She too was so happy as she proudly received her diploma. We shook hands and looked at each other for a short while. I didn't say anything, but she knew I was trying to say thank you.
TEENAGE LIFE. There was nothing more exciting on my first year in college than to be in the Dean's list. I was preoccupied with books and more books that I had no time for finding a girl that would perhaps inspire me more to reaching that banner at the end of the pole, which my friends suggested was the best inspiration for a college dude.
Being exemplary in class was indeed an asset for me and a sort of edge for men who would like to draw attention from the opposite sex. In other words, there are a lot of ladies out there who would ask for a personal or private tutorial. Not that these men would take advantage of the situation, but com'on, if the girls are quite dazzling and winsome in and out, then saying no would mean losing the chance of knowing them.
What happened to me was an exact example of a love that blossomed out from lecturing mathematics and physics. We were just best of friends, the likes that would go out together to watch movies without any commitment or promises or engagement that we hold so dear. We cracked jokes as though we've known each other for quite sometime and without so much fear that one of us may get hurt. We felt we could easily gibe to our own actions and consequences. On late afternoons, I was in her boarding house for math tutorials. Or let me say a group study, only that there were just the two of us, eager to learn things together. I had to leave her for the dorm at nine, or ten if there was a need for extension.
The irony behind was, I was actually eyeing for another girl in our batch who happened to be her best friend. In short, she was just my "backer" whose job was to report heartening news that eventually would make me restless for the rest of the night. Out of friendship, we did stuff like this for almost a year.
Second year. I never expected my best friend would turn out to be my lover. All our pranks made me see something in her nobody cared to notice and appreciate. I was kind of a fool to let a year pass by before realizing that I really didn't have to look far to find a treasure. All I had to do was to dig it out and abracadabra, there it was, laid all for myself. We were both surprised honestly, that we found ourselves asking so many whys. Ah, we're just one of those love pairs agog to discover something new.
That was the beginning of it all. All the more, we became the closest friends we never planned or hoped for. We went out to malls and trekked places we seldom travel when we were still 'friends'. We shared the same pains and joys and drenched ourselves with lots of fun and adventures. But least we expected, something just went wrong which needed a major fix: our studies. Somehow we set it aside, forgetting that mine were under a scholarship grant and that her sister supported hers.
Sad, she had to say goodbye. Hurting though, I had to set her free. I did. We had to untie the bond that we so much value for years, for some good reasons. Our other important priorities just could not wait the needed attention they have been deprived of for quite a long time. We had given up something, yet we gained trust, confidence, and a guaranty of strength in ourselves that we could truly be proud of. I lost her, maybe physically. But memories of her would go on and always be inside for me to look back and to reminisce all the days of my life.
I still have many teenage love stories of my life to tell. But I have decided to keep it to myself first, for what love is--when it strikes, when it begins to rattle, when it tells you what life is without her, cannot just be written or expressed in a page or two. For the story is more than just going together and having fun, more than sharing pains and heartaches and greater than just saying 'I love yous' and sweet goodnights. I tell you, it's different and so special.
For now, I am without someone to spend my loving touch with, yet extensively happy and contented - for a good-paying job, for a family that cares, for friends who never cease to give me a hand when situations seem too difficult to go through and for a life blessed with so much excitement and joy.
I am glad that love came to me for a moment in my life and held me through rough times. And just as life itself is a gift that comes and goes in its own time, so too the coming of love must be taken as an unfathomable gift that cannot be questioned of its ways.
As Kent ended his article, "Love has its own time, its season, and its reason for coming and going... You can only embrace it when it arrives and give it away when it comes to you... Love always has been and will always be a mystery...If you keep your heart open, it will come again."
Labels: Blogging, Philippine Articles
2 Comments:
i thought this post was great it really hit home for me cause the situations were like those of my own...and presently im going thru the same feeling of loosing another person whom i had fallen in love with...it is hard and something that is necessary but i strongly agree with remembering the good times we had together and just loosing her physically rather then mentally.. thanks garrett
July 31, 2008 10:03 AM
Hi Garrett~ i'm happy that you like the post. I wish you a gradual emotional healing. Love hurts. But we can get over it, promise :-)
July 31, 2008 3:52 PM
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