Day Seven::Love is Easy

The summer before my freshman year in high school I fell hopelessly in love with a boy named Chris. Chris and I met several years before that at a football game and we were best friends, which consisted of a good deal of time talking on the phone. I didn't realize I had anything more than friendly feelings towards Chris until he started dating a girl named Margaret. I was heart broken to have lost my best friend, and so I did what any respectable high school girl would do - I confessed my true feelings and he broke up with Margaret to be with me.

My relationship with Chris had all the drama you would expect of a high school love affair. We were absolutely crazy about each other which, in and of itself, produced a good deal of drama. We were jealous of other people and left very little room in each other's lives for anyone else. However, our parents wisely kept us apart as much as they could get away with to keep this adolescent love from burning a scar on us both forever. After not quite a year, our relationship had an explosive ending, that required we never speak again.

Chris went on to other serious relationships, I decided never to date seriously again in high school. However, as I look back now - memories of Chris make me smile and he will always have the title - "my first love" in the book of my life.

Loving Chris was easy. He was a handsome, smart boy - he was a football player, an honor student, and he did all those things that a boyfriend should do. He gave me the biggest teddy bear I have ever seen (still to this day) for Christmas and sent me beautifully boxed roses for Valentine's day. He made mixed tapes with old romantic songs and snapped up any opportunity to be with me. I think if you asked Chris, he would tell you that loving me back then was easy too.

There's no doubt that the feelings we shared were very real, but as adults we aren't together. The interesting thing is, that not one person reading this is surprised by that last statement, but as adults we fall in love with people and decide that because there is love there, that it's enough for a life long commitment and the sad truth is, sometimes it's not.

When young people fall in love, we never doubt that they aren't meant to be together. We never doubt that as life progresses that time and experience will pull them apart. As adults we decide we are infinitely wiser than those "love struck kids," maybe we feel like we are far more selective in giving our hearts away, but the truth is sometimes we aren't. Sometimes the person we give our hearts to, isn't who they present themselves to be, but because we are "adults" we tack the world "real" in front of love and we preserve on, following up love with words like "compromise" and "sacrifice."

Love is the easy part, as well it should be and perhaps if we remember how quickly it comes (and how quickly it fades) we wouldn't be so quick to grab ahold of it and declare it to be "real" before we see how we grow and traverse the rough roads together.