Coming out was a liberating moment. Sharing such personal information with anyone is nerve racking. I can remember the instant feeling as if my stomach would explode with butterflies every time I contemplated sharing the matter. Thankfully, while I was eating at 54th Street with my mom, the words, “Mom, I like guys.” seemed to unassertively mumble their way out of my mouth. As a result, she was perfectly understanding and acceptable with my homosexuality. With her blessing, I dated my very first boyfriend. Reflecting from my current state of mind, that experience had an immense impact on my comprehension of love, which prompted me to learn more about my identity.
     I can still remember the time when my first boyfriend and I were dating for about two months. It was marvelous, at the beginning. I liked him, and I thought he felt the same. You see, when I stared into his eyes, I melted into a pathetic, yet perfect puddle of dirty water. And when we embraced, I filled up with so much excitement I evaporated, leaving only the dirt to blow away in the windstorm down the road.
     Together we tried the notorious cliché date to see a romance flick at the local movie theater. But paying attention to the movie held little significance in comparison to my real goal: to hold his hand. I had to. It seemed as if I would get a pseudo bliss feeling that I longed too hard for. I wanted him to feel the spark of perfection that I felt, as if our feelings for each other we equally reciprocated. See, I was there loving him unconditionally and regardless of his faults, while he wasn’t there for the shattering pieces of me.
     We walked into the theaters as the lights darkened, and that day there wasn’t the gradual change from light to dark, but rather substantially different. The lights remained bright for what felt like to be a year, then all of a sudden they went pitch black in two months. At that instant the angry, red, and dull lights lit along the path to the door, or the exit. That particular path was obvious to him, or so he claimed. But to me it was oblivious, the lights weren’t angry to me; they lit up with happiness, they lit up with love and passion, and instead of leading to the exit they started at the door and infinitely led to our seats. There was no exit in sight for me.
     The movie began, and to this day I can’t recall what the movie title was, but as I mentioned before that was not the important part. I had to place my warm and blinded hand with his cold and fearful claw, which I originally mistook as a hand. Thud. Thud. Thud. My heart pumped with relentless fear, as it should have. Seconds became minutes and minutes became hours. Would he make the first move? Would I? Will he know to put his hand in mine if I open it? Would he even recognize what I was trying to do? All these worthless thoughts ran through my stupidly ignorant mind. Then something unexpected happened. I noticed some movement. Could it be his arm? I looked down to see his arm purposely dragging itself towards the armrest. It abruptly stopped once it reached our shared rest. At first it was face down, denying any company. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. My heart continued to pump; it was on the verge of exploding with failure.
     …Wait, something else happened . . .
     It started to turn over, doing so with such fantastic and meaningless intent. With hesitation, it started to open up. THUD. THUD. My heart was on its last beats, so I had to act fast. I placed my hand into his, interlocking our fingers loosely, and as that moment I thought I loved it. I thought I loved the idea of us. I accomplished my goal; I had that “spark” moment, while his spark had been burnt out long ago. Then I became the dirt, which blowing away in the wind, awaiting a storm.
     I was happily crushed.
     Throughout our relationship I had aspired for us to be more than what he had in mind. Looking back, I never would have guessed we were as broken and complicated as he pictured. Because it was my first relationship, I had no previous experiences to base us off of. Therefore, if I had more experience beforehand, I would have liked to change my outlook on our relationship. I wish I had gone into our relationship more levelheaded than I originally had. As I revised, I found that I seemed to have worn my heart on my sleeve, which only hurt me more in the end. Frankly, I feel such a way of thinking should never be anyone’s mindset during his or her first relationship. I say this as if you know what to expect, although most won’t figure it out until it’s too late. Nonetheless, I would change my idea of a relationship so that I don’t give more than my time away when dating somebody new, as it takes time to collect enough water to refill my puddle.