The Crush of First Love

originally posted by: olaru12
There's not a day that goes by that I don't think of Judy.....it's been 40 years. Sometimes when I play my guitar, I hear her singing...

Olly,
That was beautiful.

/raises his glass.

"Here is too Judy! May those memories never fade!"

Respectfully,
~meathead

a reply to: Mike Stivic

You're right. It is beautiful!
(Raises her glass) To our loves; whether they be past, present, or future!

So much better to love than to hate anyway. Even if it's the wistful kind.
And since love needs an object, I am convinced that the recipient is blessed in some way by that love.

In the very least, as Cultural Resilience mentioned, it makes for the foddor for many a great song/poem/prose/lots of great literature and art in general.

originally posted by: zosimov
a reply to: Mike Stivic

You're right. It is beautiful!
(Raises her glass) To our loves; whether they be past, present, or future!

So much better to love than to hate anyway. Even if it's the wistful kind.
And since love needs an object, I am convinced that the recipient is blessed in some way by that love.

In the very least, as Cultural Resilience mentioned, it makes for the foddor for many a great song/poem/prose/lots of great literature and art in general.

Here's to our spouses and sweethearts.

May they never meet.

Just thought this thread could stand a little gentle humour.

a reply to: CulturalResilience

Lol, awesome, someone had to do it!

That was pretty heavy. Whew. Now that the ice is broken, comments of any spirit are welcome!

a reply to: zosimov
I was seventeen, she was sixteen. We met on the first day of her three week visit to my home country from her home in Norway. She was a beautiful Vikingess with the personality of angel. It was the most intense three weeks of my life, and we loved as only those who secretly know they are destined to part forever, can. We made all the promises that doomed lovers make, but eventually, and inevitably the letters stopped. There was no social media back then and I could never have made enough money to cross the North Sea to visit her.

After a while I met others, and I'm sure she did to. Part of me is still back there in those three weeks of early summer and occasionally a song brings her to my mind. There have been so many since, but I still some times remember how I riled against the cruelty of fate. For a long time after she left I faced Norway and howled as only the most lonesome Timber Wolf ever could.

I have never tried to find her on social media and I suspect I never will, because finding her might sully my precious memory of her, and that is a risk I am not prepared to take.

a reply to: CulturalResilience

The imagery of the tenacious yet hapless young resilience howling for his lost Norse goddess is vivid and wonderful (with a tinge of sad amusement). Thanks for sharing.

a reply to: zosimov
I firmly believe that, after thirty plus years, I'll get over her one day. "Lost Norse Goddess" I like that, I feel a song coming on.

a reply to: CulturalResilience

What I find amusing is even after editing out my first post on this thread almost immediately. And not being on any other social media or ever searching for dating sites or using them..

I am now getting tailored ads pertaining to the contents of that post. "Meet single 40 + women seeking real love" "people finder ,find old flames"etc...

I guess the old saying is true

"Say it and forget it.
Write it and regret it."



Respectfully,
~meathead

Eta

Lol as posting this redirected me to last post the first add to pop up was plenty o fish (40+).. too funny

a reply to: Mike Stivic

Wow, that is unsettling.
Funny in a weird (siri has all the secrets) kind of unsettling.

What could have informed those ads? A keystroke log?

Targeted adds.
a reply to: Mike Stivic

a reply to: zosimov

I honestly wouldn't know. I am not really tech savvy. I am not alarmed its a fact of life in this digital age, I found it amusing..

I do know the next time I visit my friend I am going to snag his phone and do a ton of searches for oriental massage parlors..

His fiance will love it....




Respectfully,
~meathead

a reply to: Mike Stivic

lol, they will both love you for that little prank, for sure!

Reply to culturalresilance,

Yep targeted ad for sure.

I just didn't realize they were analyzing our posts here and tailoring ads to them.
I always figured they got that data from your search engine..like I said I am not tech savvy.

Either way I'm not alarmed or paranoid,I just found it funny seeing those ads pop up.

I mean its a huge leap from the garden supply ads I normally get.

Respectfully,
~meathead

originally posted by: Mike Stivic
Reply to culturalresilance,

Yep targeted ad for sure.

I just didn't realize they were analyzing our posts here and tailoring ads to them.
I always figured they got that data from your search engine..like I said I am not tech savvy.

Either way I'm not alarmed or paranoid,I just found it funny seeing those ads pop up.

I mean its a huge leap from the garden supply ads I normally get.

Respectfully,
~meathead

Maybe you should change what you do in your garden.

Epilogue: And it's a happy ending!!!

Friends, I definitely stretched my comfort zone in sharing this personal, deep-rooted and core emotional story with you, but I am now so glad I did.. I thought the OP was THE END but lo and behold there is an Epilogue which is beautiful and redemptive! To hell and back to paradise in 4 days, and I have to share the lovely ending to my sad tale.

Do you believe in coincidences? By that, I mean the literal interpretation (I think-without looking it up, but going by the root words) of two or more events occuring at the same time. No meaning, deeper symbolism or purpose behind them aside from the temporal link.

Well I don't. I have to say, I am "symbol minded". I do believe there is reason and I pay attention when obvious coincidences arise in my life. When I pay attention, I always come out the other side a lighter, happier person and this is no exception.

I have to take you to hell first in order to fully describe this short but transformative journey. A few details I neglected in my OP may show you a bit clearer why I cannot ignore this strange and wonderful event in my life.

(Deep breath)

Hell

I pretty much described how I found out that my first love had been murdered in the first post. I found a letter randomly. It spoke directly to me, with a profound message that I couldn't ignore. This compelled me to look online and find a slew of articles with his exact name (middle and all) as the victim of a terrible fatal crime.

What I left out of the OP was the most painful, horrific thing I could imagine. The first article I clicked on displayed, first thing, a still from a surveillance cam. Two (out of three of his murderers) were entering an office room at the upper left of the shot. They were absolutely terrifying looking. One was carrying a hammer, huge, dressed all in black and had his face covered the other's head was bare and I could see his face. He had a gun leveled at a figure in the bottom left of the screen. (I am sorry, it is too terrible please remember there is light at the end). In the bottom left you can see a man (my first love) entering the shot from behind a cubicle wall. His hands are up.

Yes, this was a still from the moment before he was brutally assaulted and left for dead. I'm sorry I can't sugar coat it.. can you imagine his horror?
here I must interject another amazing coincidence-I told you his nickname was Kro- we both made references to the movie at the time because he bore a striking resemblance to Brandon Lee in The Crow.. well when I heard the horrific news, I had on the screen of my computer the goodreads critique of the comic book. Weird. Especially if you know anything about the movie.
Now perhaps you can understand part of the magnitude of this event in my life. I had to hide some of my pain from my amazing, loving (sexy.. sorry if tmi but you have to understand I am very happily married) husband because he didn't understand. I reached out to you ATS and you were wonderful. I mooned, listened to old music, trying to make sense of the events that led him there (a bit of research revealed he was going down a very dangerous path. He had aquired a very bad habit which does major damage to people) and read a few of his old letters.

Now for the amazing light at the end of the tunnel, and the lessons I learned from what I truly believe was a message from a dead loved one. Imagine the implications if true.. and if not true, then who cares? The message was still recieved loud and clear regardless of the sender

Sheye, you were not the only person to mention or wonder what I was meant to get out of learning about this random horrific event that cut a man's (someone who was at one time my whole world) life short before his 39th birthday. Well this was also in the back of my head while I was going through the excruciating pains that sometimes accompany new growth.

I didn't see a reason. I was a mess inside and keeping it together outside. I realized that I had a mass of unsettled and raw emotions regarding my first love and losing him etc.. this led me back to reading a few of his letters (yes I have a box of momentos oh well I'm glad I kept them) and getting the incredible music therapy I needed. If you don't know me well on this site yet, I love music deeply. One of his old letters to me mentioned the song "Time" by Pink Floyd (I have always loved Floyd.. since my childhood). He asked me to send him the lyrics. Well of course I looked them up:

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
Fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way.
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way.

Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain.
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today.
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you.
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun.

So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again.
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older,
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death.
Every year is getting shorter; never seem to find the time.
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over,
Thought I'd something more to say.

Home Home again
I like to be here
When I can
When I come home
Cold and tired
It's good to warm my bones
Beside the fire
Far away
Across the field
The tolling of the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly spoken magic spell

Well this spoke directly to me because I have been in a major funk. My dad is in chemo. He's 75. My mom's kidney's are functioning at 22%. She just turned 70. My kids are growing up, I am wondering if I can change my career.. anyway. I've been stagnant and kind of overwhelmed by everything at once. There's more but hey we all have problems, right?

OK, Finally the very last part of my story. He also mentioned another song Poles Apart in a letter. He wrote that he was driving (he was in officer training in the Marines-- Missouri) and the song came on and he thought of me got all emotional and pulled over, in tears.

So last night I looked up the song. I knew the words by heart.

Did you know, it was all going to go so wrong for you
And did you see it was all going to be so right for me
Why did we tell you then
You were always the golden boy then
And that you'd never lose that light in your eyes
Hey you, did you ever realize what you'd become
And did you see that it wasn't only me you were running from
Did you know all the time but it never bothered you anyway
Leading the blind while I stared out the steel in your eyes
The rain fell slow, down on all the roofs of uncertainty
I thought of you and the years and all the sadness fell away from me
And did you know
I never thought that you'd lose that light in your eyes

This was too crazy. The words spoke right at me across the years. He had indeed lost the light in his eyes (so sad he had tremendous potential). I had always loved that album.
What an impact this moment had on me. I was still so sad though and not yet found the light.

cont..

I have to wrap this up because I could go on forever. The next song after Poles Apart on Youtube was Coming Back to Life

Here is an excerpt of the lyrics:
Lost in thought and lost in time
While the seeds of life and the seeds of change were planted
Outside the rain fell dark and slow
While I pondered on this dangerous but irresistible pastime

I took a heavenly ride through our silence
I knew the moment had arrived
For killing the past and coming back to life

I took a heavenly ride through our silence
I knew the waiting had begun
And headed straight ...into the shining sun

This song, the events leading up to them, everything, had the most transformative, impact on my life since my son's birth.
It was beautiful.. a light at the end of the tunnel.

I realized that: I can't waste any more time! I have a lot of life left to live and plenty of time to build new dreams and put the old to rest (while revisiting on occasion for a smile).

I faced down and dealt with an old, extremely painful memory in such a strange, wonderous fashion.

I do believe my old love, who was for many many years (if I were honest, right up until my current husband I knew no love like his) a haunting memory while he was alive, spoke to me vividly from the dead. I think he wanted to help me find peace, and maybe even motivate me right now to get that light back. This has so many implications but among them I think that the two realms (this life and the next) might be close.. that time might not follow the contraints we see (linear path).. and more I'm sure that will come to me later.

One more crazy level of "coincidence" I heard the news of his death on Easter (Christ rising from the dead). The Crow is a movie about redemption from beyond the grave. It's all too crazy.

I hope my story can touch you in a place that is meaningful and expansive. Thank you all for reading and for your wonderful words.

Back to Life.

All of what you have posted made me think of something someone much smarter that me once said. I think it goes along the lines of; there is a destiny that shapes our ends, rough hew them as we will. I think this thread has done a lot good for a lot of people, I know it has for me.

Thanks to this thread I have realised that there are some things I still need to work out, and fate brought me to this thread at a point were I have some time to begin to do just that.

How's that for serendipity Zos?
reply to: zosimov

a reply to: CulturalResilience

Quite honestly, it is deeper and more beautiful than I can fully grasp atm (especially with a beautiful little boy here that needs my attention).
But I know I will revisit this time in years to come with love and appreciation.
Thank you so much for taking this crazy little trip with me, friend. It's no small thing to have made a couple of wonderful new aquaintences through this as a bonus


Enjoy your wonderful journey!

Wonderful thread. I love love. I have a special woman in my life who does that for me everyday. There's so much love all around us, it's beautiful.

Human life is so precious.