What Robin Rice discovered about a brief high school affair made her wonder: How would her life have been different had she known?
—
First love. You hear a lot about it. How you never forget. If I’m honest, I had a lot of “first loves,” and not a lot of love. What can I say? It was what you might call a rough adolescence.
As it turns out, though, one was different. I just didn’t know it. The story plays out like this:
Rob was an awesome guy, and more popular than me in high school. He was cool. He was liked. He was handsome. But he had something else going for him. While I would not have been able to name it then, today I’d say it was substance and soul.
I might have had substance and soul as well, but I was an outsider. Not as pretty as his girlfriend. Not as popular. You don’t try to compete with girls like that. You don’t even think to.
Despite the disparities, we had a date. I know, I know—he was already taken. But truth be told, I didn’t think I could afford to have a lot of rules about things like that.
It was lovely. We had wine (something he’d never tried), and he showed me a thing or two about sex I’d yet to discover—for that reason alone I’d remember him forever. But like most of my high school “loves,” it was one date and done.
◊♦◊
Advance thirty-plus years. He finds me on Facebook. He later says seeing me there took his breath away. It took mine away, though I could not say why.
It wasn’t about a clandestine affair or a reunion that would dramatically change four lives.
|
I like to imagine the fates were perching above us, smiling and murmuring amongst themselves: “Let’s see how it goes this time…”
It feels important to note here that I am deeply happy in my marriage. Rob is, too. So whatever “this” was, it wasn’t about a clandestine affair or a reunion that would dramatically change four lives.
But if it wasn’t that, what was it? And why did it feel this way, so long after? The question hung in the air.
I casually said I’d love to chat. He said he wanted to read one of my books first. No fair. He’d know a lot more about me today that I would about him. Then again, he might not like my books, and that would probably be good to know up front.
Turns out, he liked the one he read. He was ready to talk. And so from Texas to Maryland, across the phone, two souls once again touched at a pinpoint moment in time and space.
If that sounds dramatic, all I can say is you weren’t there. You didn’t feel it.
◊♦◊
I expected a talk about our lives, maybe my book, how Facebook was changing the world. But he had something to say, something he’d waited a long, long time to say.
It utterly blew me away.
“I thought about you constantly after that one date. For years it was daily. Then, because it was ruining my life, I forced it to an every week or so category. When I met my wife, maybe once every month.”
Someone loved me, and I didn’t know?
|
There’s a reason for the cliché about your heart pounding. You can feel it, and you’d swear someone standing close by would be able to see it. You put your hand to your chest and try to breathe normally.
“I was stupid,” he continued. “I didn’t know how to stop living my superficial life, to stop caring what other people thought. But no one had ever made me feel like you made me feel. Like at that moment, I was special, and the only person you cared about. You were so kind and thoughtful. You planned out the date with wine and everything. Afterwards, I didn’t know what to think or what to do.”
Like a bullet ricocheting down a long set of narrow alley walls, I was trying to make sense of it.
Someone loved me, and I didn’t know?
“I was sure it wouldn’t go over well,” he continued. “I knew my girlfriend and her friends would turn on you. They were ugly. I figured my friends would understand, at least my good friends. But I waited too long. When I asked you out again, thinking we could work through how we would bring “us” out to everyone, you were already dating someone else.”
He paused here, and then simply said: “I was crushed.”
Wait. WAIT.
Rob loved me, and I didn’t know? How could I not know?
For the record, yes I was dating someone else soon after, but that never lasted for long.
“Wait another week and ask again, Rob,” I pleaded to his 30-years-ago-self while his current self waited nervously for my response over the phone. To be honest, I am not sure what I said in reply. All I can remember is what I was thinking:
What might it have been like, if I had known?
◊♦◊
Our call lasted an hour maybe. We did go on to other topics. But it took me a few days to really grasp what he’d said. To think of someone thinking about me, every day, holding me as his ideal—when it seemed to me the whole world was just as happy to throw me away? It boggled my mind.
It was as if someone reshuffled all my memories, upgrading each one.
|
I wondered, did he think of me the day I nearly took my life in college? How about the day I married my oh-so-not-like-Rob first husband? Was he thinking of me the day I left that husband, giving up my children for half of every week? Was he thinking of me in those long years between husbands when I dated dud after dud after dud, thinking no one would ever really get me?
How might it all have been different, had I known? It was as if someone reshuffled all my memories, upgrading each one.
I had not been alone, even though I had thought I was. I had not been unlovable. My kindness did not go unnoticed, and in fact it had mattered more than my looks or my popularity.
Imagine that.
Today I have a beautiful life—one I could never have believed I would find back then. I am deeply loved by my wonderful husband. I have amazing friendships. I even have an “audience” of readers and a long list of students and clients who see what it seems Rob saw back then. I am successful by all counts and measures I know.
You might even say I am popular.
◊♦◊
Still, for months I continued to wonder…
How might it have been different if I had known Rob was thinking of me? If I had known such a man was measuring every girl that came after our one date by the standard of how I made him feel? If I had known he waited to marry until he found the woman who made him feel the way I had? That he has even told her about me. (ME???)
And then, just as I was considering writing this very article, it dawned on me: Maybe I did know. Maybe that invisible force that binds us all in love, whatever we might choose to call it, has surrounded me all these years.
Maybe that’s why I am still alive. Maybe that’s why I left my oh-so-not-like-Rob first husband. Maybe it’s why I waded through dud date after dud date, holding out until my beloved Brian came along.
Today I am not only loved and love in return; I have actually attempted to become some kind of mass vehicle for love. My own unique brand, of course, with my own funk and style. In books. In teaching. And yes, on Facebook.
In my own way, through words such as these, I attempt to pour the wine for any thirsty soul.
Perhaps you can thank Rob for that.
You just never know.
—
Looking for a relationship? The Good Men Project promises to have a really good one with your inbox. Sign up for our daily or weekly newsletter here.
—
Also by Robin Rice: Pure Hot Holy Anger and How it Can Move You to Make A Difference
Photo: Flickr/Made Underground
we picked out a ring , I was in the Air Force, her dad said no engagement till next year. I found out she had lied to me , but still dated. Then she was not allowed to go out when I was over, she was 20! i left in a huff. I called and her mom said we don think you should see her anymore, I sent flowers, but they didnt tell her, kids now with their cell phones can over come parents like that. I met my wife and 39 years later I called Heather’s mother and got… Read more »
Thanks for a beautiful story and tenderness!
I guess in my case, I would be Rob. I found my first love on FB after 34 years of lost contact. Our stories are a little different, but so similar in many ways. We’re both very happily married also, but I felt compelled to confess to her how I felt back then and how I have carried a torch for her all these years. We’re good friends now… but I think there will always be something a little extra beyond just friendship between us. Unlike you, we never dated or had anything happen between us other than mutually unconfessed… Read more »
Loved your story I recently found out the same. First love saying that he never stopped loving me . And yes thinking if I had only known.. and in some mysterious way I always knew♥️
After 2 years in marriage with my Husband with a kid, my husband started going out with other ladies and showed me cold love, on several occasions he threatens to divorce me if I dare question him about his affair with other women, I was totally devastated and confused until a friend told me about a spell caster who help people with their relationship and marriage problem by the powers of love spells, at first I doubted if such thing ever exists but decided to give it a try, when I contact him and told him my problem, he helped… Read more »
38 years and I’m still stupid in love with “Papoose”…and I’m 8 years married. The entire relationship has been nothing short of MADDENING
Be careful it’s a 50/50 gamble that I lost. I am sitting here heartbroken like I haven’t been in decades. My first love tracked me down as well. She lead me on for months told me she’s loved me how special I was her etc.
When I was 13 I met my 1st love. He was 17. A sweet and special person. I was a tomboy and I was shocked that I had such a crush on a guy. We kissed twice. He was my 1st kiss. My parents found out and told me I couldnt see him anymore. They wouldnt even let me talk to him on the phone (they were very strict). I never saw or heard from him again. I was crushed. I never got to tell him how I felt. I had no idea how he felt about me. I heard… Read more »
I have just had a situation happen to me that has my heart going crazy, I am a widower of just under 2 years, and in March 2017 I went to see my cousins in N.Y and we started talking about my first love (The first woman I wanted to marry when I was 16) (BTW I am now 48 ), well after 2 months I get a message on Facebook from her (my Snuggles).I have talked every day for at least 3-5 hours and feel like I am a 16 year old boy all over again. Next month she… Read more »
I think this quote within your writing set me free! Thank you for this…”Maybe I did know. Maybe that invisible force that binds us all in love, whatever we might choose to call it, has surrounded me all these years.”
Hearing all these stories, truly sound like there is hope. I still wait for god to send a sign that there is true love for me out there. I had suffered from amnesia, for years couldn’t remember my past. a resent concussion brought it all back, there for I search and search online. I even paid website for public records for my ex and found nothing, I search every way except for investigators. I had true love, and lost it. I have grown a lot, matured so much and realized I had it all. But god is good, I ask… Read more »
I found my first love on Facebook 19 years later and all these feelings of what if and what could have been, came to me. He is married and I just got out of a 19 year marriage. He still remebers every detail about the day I chose someone else (my ex husband) over him. Yet, I feel like there is some kind of unfinished business between us. I’m a believer of everything happens for a reason and I know that us reuniting after so long is because either I need to help him or he needs to help me.… Read more »
My first love & I reconnected after 23 years through Facebook. I was separated at the time and he was/is dating someone, but I confessed to him in one of our hours long phone conversations that he was always the “one that got away” and that I regretted breaking up with him more than just about anything. He had gotten stationed in Korea while we were dating, but I was still a senior in high school, so we sent many letters, and had huge phone bills, and even sent cassette tapes of us talking to the other, but I was… Read more »
Leave it alone all will only end in your heartache. I’ve just been through something of the same my first love from thirty years ago tracked me down on facebook. He said all the right things he was in unhappy marriage always loved me. Was sorry for how he treated me way back then. We met up a couple of times. Even made arrangements twice to be with each other. Once i expressed doubts he dropped me like a hot potatoe. I had asked on a number of occasions if he was only looking for sex he said no but… Read more »
Debbie
My first love found me after 33 years on Facebook. I never knew I popped his cherry like he did mine as well. I was married but not anymore because sometimes real love never dies. His mother made him move to Florida because he got caught selling weed at school. So when he came back a year or two later I was seeing someone so he went back to Florida. Me not knowing how he really felt for me until now
At 41 years old, I found my elementary school crush on Facebook. I sent them a request, and was denied. I am single and have never been married. So as you can imagine, my view of the opposite sex will never be the same again.
Sounds like it was one sided and you never hung out Secret crushes have no connecting feelings inside the other person.
I and my Husband stay together but we aren’t together for 3 months now , what he did was start texting going out, not coming home till the next day kinda relation ,no sex though i would had a feeling….nothing real serious…..He tells me that he is tired of me. i got devastated .. but i know other girls wont stop texting/calling, i really love him and i don’t wanna leave nor give up on what we’ve become…I wrote robinson.buckler @ yahoo (.com) to do a love spell for me and after 3 days, my husband became mine again, no… Read more »
OMG…I just had this happen to me the other day and that’s why I googled the topic. I found your article. It touched my heart. We just spoke on the phone a few days ago…after 30 years. He professed his true feelings for me, which I never knew. It made me wonder how things would have played out had I known back then what I know now. I’m not sure how things will develop…but I’m enjoying the ride so far!
yes babe its me
A nice story. 31 years ago, I met a girl. I lost her due to my own insecurities and a lack of understanding of what she needed from a boyfriend. She initiated contact with me so I thought she would always be there. This was not to be as she soon thereafter said that she wanted to move on. I couldn’t see why she was saying this at the time and I let her go. Two weeks later I saw her with another guy so assumed that she did, in fact, move on. Soon after that, I moved to another… Read more »
After over 20 years my first love found me. We are now making plans for the future. I clicked on this post just out of curiosity and it hit me as his name is Robb and I’m moving from Texas to Florida.
I just found my first love after 30 yrs also! This happened three days ago and I haven’t slept since. She didn’t seem upset at my text but neither sounded too surprised. But she did write back and even said “goodnight”. She is in Oregon now and I am in Texas but LOVE if it is real, and mine for Angie Gaye Slayton is REAL, cannot be dampened by time or distance. I love you Angie! Not a single day passed that I didn’t think about you. I’m not sure how you feel but I hope you remain open to… Read more »
I had the very same experience a few months ago. I heard from a guy from HS who liked me and we had a short platonic friendship that ended when i kissed another guy in front of him. He was devastated and i thought he hated me all these years. He e-mailed me after 35 years to say hi and to catch up. We are both married now. We meet one night for drinks and to talk. I told him i was so sorry for what i did to him 35 years ago and that i always loved him throughout… Read more »
I moved many times as a child, and the brief memories of the few people who were kind to me were what kept me going. Your story reminded me of them… and I thought of how different society is now. Social media has changed the evolution of human relationships in yet unknowable ways. Thank you for sharing.
From the bottom of my heart.. thank you so much! You insipire me to take a second step after a long elementary friend contacted me through facebook. It doesnt matter if it supposed “to mean something” as “anything” would be the perfect description for whatever happens… Thank you again and best wishes for you!
“… two souls once again touched at a pinpoint moment in time and space. If that sounds dramatic, all I can say is you weren’t there. You didn’t feel it.”
It doesn’t sound dramatic to me.
It happened to me three weeks ago with my first love, after 20 years separated. Only, neither of us are married, and we found we still love each other.
We thought we’d be strangers; we’re not.
He thought his past would scare me away; it doesn’t.
I thought my past had ruined my heart; it hasn’t.
We’re giving first love a second chance.
I just spent today with my first love after 38 yrs ago. It was like we never spent the time apart. We both are single and are meeting this week for our second date.m y hearts racing my soul is smiling and I am counting the hours.
Good for you!!!!
I’m so happy for you both. I believe we all deserve second chances, especially at love.
So that was the end of your contact with this guy? When he contacted you in the first place did you discuss it with your husband first to see how he felt about it? Similar thing happened in my marriage last year when my wife’s ex from 20+ years ago found her on Facebook. Wasn’t at all a happy story like yours.