Forbidden (Part I)

Against my better judgement, I am going to take some time to blog. I worked for 11 hours today and then had orchestra rehearsal for 2.5 hours. I really should be getting ready for bed or winding down by reading "The Host" or "The China Study," both of which I desperately want to finish reading. Or I should be cooking food so that we can eat tomorrow since I will be gone from 6:45 am until 10 pm. Like I said, against my better judgement.

But... I actually have a big laundry list of things I've been wanting to blog about. I had better get started before all my good ideas get lost in all the other things I have to remember in order to function during the day. And with no further adieu...

I had an epiphany two weeks ago while driving to work and rocking out to track #2 of the Twilight soundtrack: I know exactly why I love the Twilight series. The story is about forbidden vampire love, foridden lust, foridden love triangles, forbidden you-name-it. It is saturated with all things forbidden. Incidentally, I have always harbored a certain attraction toward the forbidden. It seems to be fairly innate and subconscious, although in recent years I have become more aware and accepting of this tendency. As I drove to work that day, I realized that my life has been marked by one forbidden romance after another. So I hope you will humor me as I blog about the forbidden love life of my past (unfortunately it does not include any vampires).

8th grade. I can't remember if I noticed his tight pants or his country accent first. Either way, he stuck out like a cow amongst a flock of chickens. (I had to use that stupid analogy since he was a complete hick.) He was the new kid in my class, and besides swapping stories with the other hicks in the class about artificially inseminating the cattle on his farm (at the time I did not know what that meant), the only other thing he did during class was stare at me. For some reason I also found him to be attractive, although it could have just been the tight pants. Anyway, soon he got my number, and when he called my house it caused a rather violent reaction from my father (I was only 13 at the time-- far below the legal dating age of 16). He never called again. Soon I managed to sneak away to a school dance from a "sleepover," where we had planned to meet each other. We danced to a song by Aerosmith. It was really long and I had never stood so close to a boy before. I felt extremely awkward and also completely enthralled. Everything about this was forbidden. My parents didn't even know! ...yet.

He asked me to be his girlfriend that night, but the butterflies in my stomach combined with my intensifying guilt and spilled out into a response that sounded like, "Why don't you sneak over to my house sometime when my family is gone and I am all alone?" Yes, far less dangerous than being someone's girlfriend at school. "Hey strange new hick in class, how about I just be your booty call sometime?" Wow, I was naive. But it was forbidden and I couldn't resist.

That weekend was Halloween. Somehow, without the aid of cell phones or driver's licenses, we timed it just right. He hid his bike in the bushes by the house and was waiting in the shadows by the time my family left for trick-or-treating. And then it all happened so fast.

Gotcha! Hahaha. We sat on the couch and talked about whatever awkward 13-year olds talk about. And you thought we were going to make out! Anyway, my family came home about 10 minutes into our deep conversation. He sprinted out the back door. I said a terrified "hello" to my family and snuck outside the first chance I had. Out in the backyard, he kissed me. I don't even think we said anything. I can't say that I kissed him back; he really just planted one on my tightly pursed lips while I stood there in shock.

Anyway, to make a long story short, my family had come home early that night because they had seen his bicycle in the bushes and gotten suspicious. They confronted me when I came back inside, so I told them the truth and to their credit, they invited him to come inside. We sat in the living room and talked for a few tortuous minutes. Somehow he managed to jokingly mention something about the artificial insemination of his cattle again, and I have never forgotten the look on my mother's face. She invited him to leave shortly thereafter. For years to come I have thanked my lucky stars that my dad was out of town on that fateful night. If he had been there, I think someone would have gotten hurt. Needless to say, I "broke up" with my "unboyfriend" the next day. It was just way too dangerous for a 13-year old. I figured I'd put things on hold for a few years.

Fast forward to my 16th birthday party. Of the 52 kids that attended, 44 of them were guys, many of them a year or two older than me. It kept my parents just overwhelmed enough to stay out of the festivities that night, which were held at my house. Many of the guys brought gifts to celebrate my rite of passage as a legally datable young woman. As I was opening them and doing my best to flirt like a real 16-year old, I noticed that a guy was setting up an amp and a guitar out in the backyard. I recognized him from Spanish class. He wore a backwards baseball cap and an earring. We made eye contact and he motioned for me to come outside and join him. He announced to me (and the gathering audience) that he had a very special gift for me. To my utter amazement, he proceeded to play/sing my favorite song, "With Arms Wide Open." I must have mentioned that song sometime during class! How did he know how much I loved that song? There was something magical about it that night, and there was something about him that drew me in.

We began corresponding with each other, and I soon abandoned all the other guys who took me on first dates during the weeks after I turned 16. He came to visit me on one particularly hot August afternoon (yes, I remember the exact date). He parked his huge blue truck ("Big Betty," I believe he called it) in front of my house. We talked and laughed beneath the blazing sun for quite some time. I had been trying to be discreet about how hot the pavement was on my bare feet-- I felt as if they would blister, but I didn't want to venture away from this attractive boy and his big truck. Suddenly he burst into laughter. He had a deep laugh that seemed too manly for his age. He reached down and pulled me close to him so that my feet balanced on his boots. He had just returned from a shift of work at a construction site, and he wore dirty jeans and a dingy tank top. I could feel his sweat as I clutched my hands around his neck, and he smelled like musk and sawdust. He said something about being sorry that my feet were getting burned on the pavement. Our faces were inches away, and the fervor of sun and summer lust enveloped us completely. Soon the August heat was indistinguishable from the feeling of his warm lips on mine. We melted into each other for a moment, and then I stood there in a daze of fever and first love as the rumbling of his truck faded into the distance.

We were never too far from each other after that August day. My parents noticed how much time we were spending together, and they issued their official declaration of disapproval. It did absolutely nothing to sway our affection for each other. Our summer love gained momentum into the fall and the start of a new school year. It wasn't long before we were viewed "together" by our classmates, although we maintained a distinct level of separateness... boyfriend and girlfriend, steady, exclusive, etc., were all forbidden terms for the sake of being truthful to my parents, who maintainted their unrelenting disapproval as our affection for each other grew. We never held hands or kissed at school (with the exception of a few secret places we knew of), although throughout most of our relationship this was difficult for him. He didn't want to hide how he felt for me, nor did he enjoy my unwilling attempts to withold my feelings for him in front of others. He wanted to love me freely, and if I could do it all over again I would have allowed it. After all, our non-boyfriend/girlfriend relationship caused enough drama that terms and titles mattered little in the long run.

So, you want to know the rest of the story, eh? Well, you'll just have to keep checking my blog. :) Truthfully, I am exhausted (although energized by transforming my memories into rhetoric) and I need to call it a night before I get too carried away. There is still much to write about, and if you stick around long enough you might be lucky enough to learn to full story of how my forbidden loves led me to the love of my life. While I hope you enjoy reading all of this, I'm mostly doing it for my own sake-- to relive and remember this part of my life. More to come soon. :)