That first “true” love

Princess Ah-Ah hosts the Carnival of the Mundane this week and has asked me for a submission. This is the third request to me from a host/ess and while I love being invited I must say that I’ve developed a bit of a complex about the matter. Perhaps I should title my blog….

THE TOKEN BLOG: Those Bland Life Thingits Nobody Cares About But Me…

Ah-ah chooses the topic of “The Ones That Got Away (or alternately, The Ones That Ran For Their Lives…)” as our assignment and Geez…this just sucks because this is the absolute truth…

I was deeply in love with a young TIMOTHY GORDON HESS when I was 13 years old and in the seventh grade. He was lean, tall, wore glasses, was also 13, and had a paper route that took him by my house 6 days a week.

We had a few classes together, but I actually sat across from him in Science class. Yeah, I didn’t make a really good grade in Science class that year…or in any other class Timothy was in. And Timothy? He was a straight A student. I shoulda just copied off him…dammit!

Being 13, Timothy and I spent a lot of time just playing. We played at my house, his house, all over the little rural area we lived in, and at school. Timothy eventually gave me a section of his paper route and then we got to play around after school before we started our routes. We’d get into trouble in some of our classes, my house, and his, but we had the best fun together!

People were always commenting to us about how they’d “seen” us riding our bikes down a road or on the way to the stone quarry; walking the rail road tracks or playing in the creek by the park; or hanging out just about anywhere. Some time later I was told that people always thought we were “going together,” but no…we were just really good friends (despite my huge crush on the boy) so many were startled when he “took” another friend as his date on the 7th grade class trip. It turned out okay for me as a bunch of us ended up as a group, so we still did a few rides together as a pair—I had little less fear about some rides than she did.

Timothy and I were fast friends all through the 7th, 8th, and 9th grades. Towards the end of the 9th grade I was shocked when he asked me to be his date for the student council dinner—the equivalent of a prom in our very rural area. I mean we had to dress up and everything!

We had a busy summer between 9th and 10th grades. My family was preparing to move away, and still Timothy didn’t know what a huge crush I’d had on him for years. We exchanged many letters during our 10th grade year apart and when I told him I was coming for a long weekend to visit an old girl friend that summer he demanded a day of my time.

I rode on my friend’s bike to meet him near my old house. There were no hugs for greetings, instead he yelled, “Let’s go!” I pedaled my bike fast behind his to the stone quarry. Once there we climbed to the top and Timothy asked me to keep following him—he had something special to show me.

Eventually he grabbed up my hand while he was asking me if it was okay. Yeah, like I was gonna pull it way. TIMOTHY…GORDON…HESS was holding MY hand. We’d hiked a bit further and suddenly Timothy admits to me that he thinks of me as his girl friend and has for some time.

It was one of those “OMG” moments, you know…

And then he asks if he can kiss me!

And I was so shocked that he even asked. And I’m thinking a thousand things at once. Like how long I’ve been in love with Timothy Gordon Hess and he didn’t know. And how I’ve never kissed a boy at all. AND A MILLION OTHER THINGS.

“No, ” I finally say. “Not today.”

He asked me again and again. And even said please. He wanted to know why. And I just gave him the lame, “not today” answer again and again.

We spent the rest of the day at a special place in the creek he discovered without me. It really was pretty.

I remember telling my old girl friend all about it, too.

Finally even Timothy and his family moved away from the area. We still wrote some letters and exchanged a few phone calls, but we eventually just stopped keeping in contact. It happens, you know.

Years later I read where he had died in a car accident at Penn State.

I still think of him sometimes…and miss him.

….and wish I had said, “yes.”