Things from my Past

My dear friend Kelli has been doing something fun with her blog. Each week she posts a new question to write about. It’s meant to be a means of writing down stories from your past and establishing a personal history. She’s done two questions now, and I’m going to answer them both in this one post.

1- Who was your first love?

I’ve never talked much about my love life because there’s not much to tell. I’ve been pretty much single all along. But I have dated, and been in love, and even been kissed full on the lips – believe it or not – and I remember my first boyfriend very well.

His name was Justin Sparhawk. He was a very cute blonde who could play the drums, was a great dancer, and loved biking. He had a quiet personality, which I really like even now, but was confident and fun, and he treated me well. He was very good with compliments.

We met at Ricks College, now BYU Idaho, in the fall of 1988 when we were both brand new Freshman. I was at the first dance of the semester with Marla (who was in Rexburg attending Cosmetology school) and a friend from Minnesota named Andrea Miles. A little back-story – Justin’s family lived in a small town in Minnesota that was within our stake boundaries when we were in high school, and then his family moved to Provo. I didn’t know him then, but Andrea had met him a few times. Andrea saw him at the dance at Ricks, walked right up to him and asked, “Are you Justin Sparhawk?” He stuck with us for the rest of the evening, and then after the dance we went all to the Maverick for giant sized drinks. That Maverick was a hub of social activity in Rexburg, Idaho. We dated steadily from then on. I honestly don’t remember what we did on our first date, but on the whole we did the usual things: movies, dances, hanging out and watching tv. He took me to Homecoming. I had a bright pink dress with poofy sleeves and a poofier skirt, very 80s.

One night we went dancing at The Galleria, another hot spot in Rexburg, and afterward he walked me home. We stood outside talking, and then he gave me a hug, and then he kissed me. It was my first kiss, and took me completely by surprise. The air was cold, so his lips felt cold at first. It tingled and made my head spin.

A first kiss should make your head spin, but that makes it hard to remember any more details. I’m wanting to write that last paragraph better, but that’s all I’ve got. I do remember, very well, doing a lot more kissing after that and really liking it. Really liking it.

We didn’t date for very long, about four months, and then he broke up with me, and it broke my heart. I cried for weeks. My poor sister and roommate were kind of worried, but like all first heartbreaks it eventually healed. I dated others during my college years, and after, and fell in love again a few times over, even more in love than I was with Justin. But you never forget the first. He really was nice, a good choice for a first love.

Question 2 – What was your first car?

This topic does not bring back the emotions that the first one did. My first car was a light blue Ford Escort. I don’t remember the year, but I bought it in 1990 or 91, so it had to have been a late 80s model. I really liked my little car. It was so, so much fun to have it all to myself. I guess I don’t have any exciting stories to tell, certainly nothing like I’ve got with my Honda. I drove it for about a year and a half, and then needed to be rid of it because I’d decided to go on a mission. Barry and Melody were co-signers on the loan, so they traded it in on something new for themselves. That cleared my loan, which was what I needed. I went home to Minnesota for a few months, and then was off to the California Santa Rosa mission.

I learned how to drive in the hay fields back on my parent’s farm. I was maybe nine or ten years old. Dad would put me behind the wheel of our 1977 Ford pick-up truck, get it moving for me, and then have me steer it straight ahead while he and my brothers threw the hay into the truck bed and a trailer. When I was a little older, he took me out on the gravel roads to learn how to work the clutch. We all had to learn with a stick shift first. Of course, that’s all we had in our vehicles, so there wasn’t much of a choice, but Dad was adamant that we learn how to drive a stick. Once you can do that, he said, you can drive anything. He was right.

Those are my stories. It makes me smile to think back on all of this now. I think that one of the benefits of doing this is that you remember the good things that make up your life. All of the little parts and pieces of the whole, and on the whole I’ve been pretty lucky in my experiences. If you'd like to do some of this, you can get ideas from Kelli, right here.