Day 3: My first love.

This is a laugh, and sorely disappointing, for us both. I've been in three serious relationships (and two other not-as-serious, but those don't matter). In all three, the L word (not "lesbian," or "lesbians") was used at one point or another.

In my last relationship, I refused to say it until I knew I meant it, because I knew if I did, I'd be saying it because I wanted to mean it, not because I really did. So I waited. And waited... Aaaaand waited. Finally, the time seemed right to say it. And I did. And for a brief, shining moment, I thought I was in love... But, alas, I was not. So I can't say that any one person was my first love. Not in that sense, anyway.

No, my story, on this glorious Third Day of Band-Wagon Blogging is of the first time I honestly, truly, learned to love and respect my mother. Of course you love your mom from the first moment you peek from her she holds you in her arms and offers you her swollen feeds you. But I feel like that's the kind of unconditional "I love you because I have to" love, like the relationship I share with my dad. All my life, my mom was my biggest fan, and I loved her, more than unconditionally. She was there in my ups and downs, she was then when I fell to help me up, etc. But I only realized how much she meant to me after my first year of college (which was also about the time I finally came out to her.) I don't know what clicked, but the first summer I was back, we were inseparable. Thick as thieves. It was really fun, and I was almost sad to go back to school. I wish I could give you an exact moment, an event where I realized, "This is the most intelligent, loving, caring, wonderful woman in the world and I'm lucky to have her as my mother," but I can't. It was a gradual thing.

Anyway, my point being, the first time I was truly aware of my capability to love was toward my mother, and I hope that I can feel similarly (but not the same, obviously, that would be creepy...) toward that special person in my future.

Much, much, MUCH love,
Ash