First love never dies

We were at a benefit dinner when I caught a gentleman dressed in a light summer suit throwing glances my way from across the room. I smiled and turned to my cousin. “Don’t look now but at 3 o’clock position, there’s a man who seems to have focused his gaze on our table. Do you recognize him?” My cousin slowly turned her head, pretended to click her camera and whispered back, “He looks familiar but I can’t place him yet; maybe later.”  

That night, the orchestra catered to the young-once with a musical repertoire from the ’60s, ’70s and early ’80s.  We danced the boogie, the twist, and the maski-paps, including those one-line, repetitive sing-along verses of sha-la-las, the du-wop-du-wops and doobie-doos.

After a few weeks, my cousin called. “Now I remember!” she exclaimed. “He was a cosmetic surgeon who courted you when we were in high school.”

“Huh?” I exclaimed. “How come I don’t remember him?”

“I don’t know,” she replied. “He stood out in a sea of young men because he was well-groomed and impeccably dressed. He made you bakod at dance parties, which was a clear attempt to catch your attention.”

“Really? What happened next?” I asked. “Don’t look at me,” she laughed. “Maybe you found him too grown up and experienced.”

Can memory play tricks to erase or blot out some personalities and events in one’s life? Was he so insignificant or did he give me a sad experience that made me push him down into a deep abyss or the far corners of my mind?

He still looked very gallant and kind. “It must be the age gap, nothing else,” I surmised.

Over merienda, my high school mate, Elvie Gonzalez, remarked, “Letty used to wear a tiny gold watch with changeable leather bracelets in high school. I swore that I would get exactly the same model, in time, but it never happened.”

That day, I bolted home to look for the old watch. The hallmark bore a stamp: 1953. When I wound the crown, the hands began to move. It was so small that I could not read the dial; maybe it was my fading eyesight. Seeing the watch, however, triggered flashbulb memories of my mother and the lessons she taught me. “Take good care of your things so that they will last a long time and you can pass them on to your children someday.”

“What about your first love? Did you keep him like your old watch?” asked Lency Roceles, another classmate.

My eyes rolled. I was beaming. “You never forget your first love,” I remarked. Everyone broke into hoots of laughter, raising their arms, whistling and shrieking in merriment.  Obviously, we each kept tender memories of the first boy who came into our lives, who made us blush and gave meaning to the first stirrings of the heart. Candies, flowers, holding hands, moonlit nights and the carving of initials on a tree were sweet, consequential tidbits that were stored in the pinkest, rosiest part of our hearts.

When you hear a haunting refrain, a soft melody, or you see a familiar landscape and view anything serene and beautiful, don’t you just feel the floodgates of your heart opening to a rush of emotion? Your body and your brain are also swamped, if not snowed under.

What about the heartbreak, the pain and disappointment?

You never forget.

From First Love comic book drawing

One blogger wrote, “That first tear in your heart leaves a scar that heals but it will always remain. If you forget your first love, then it wasn’t love to begin with.”

I remember my brother and his first love, Evelyn. It was puppy love that never grew into a more stable and serious relationship. He eventually married a beautiful woman who brought love, stability and sunshine into his life. She, too, had a successful marriage.  Whenever Evelyn’s name came up, it brought him back to the fire and the spirit of his youth when all he wanted was to make the best of what life had to offer. “I’ll have the world spinning, if not on a plate, right?” he said. She was the first to see the sparkle in his eyes — his first muse.

One night, my brother called from overseas. “Did you hear that Evelyn is dying? She has an inoperable cancer and is now under pain management. Isn’t it first love never, ever dies?”

“That’s a tired cliché,” I thought, but I sensed the sadness in his voice, so I kept quiet. To comfort him, I quoted an old verse:

“We cannot stop our lives at one unhappy experience or waste time regretting or pining over it. Neither can we blot it out of our hearts saying it never existed.

We can only face life and go on, remembering that no love, honestly, truly and sincerely given, is ever lost. Its richness in the heart, whatever happens, is always a part of life.”

My brother prayed and lighted a candle for his first love.

I am doing the same for mine.