First Kiss

I still remember the place where I had my very first kiss. I remember it exactly. I could go there today and sit right there, I could point out where he sat and where I sat.  I could tell you just what the March weather was like, I can remember the very texture of the California air. I could describe just how I felt, how nervous I was and how happy. I could trace my steps to the bus afterward, spreading my arms as if to hug the sky.  I could trace my emotions for the next few days, the memory still burning fresh in my heart. I used to come back to that place all the time, I would sit and think, and time and space would bend, filling me with that very sensation, that freedom, that magic. It's amazing how powerful a place can be.

Then time passed. There was a space between me and him, I was miles and roads and states from that place.  I moved on, and so did my heart.  I grew up, I changed, I became someone I never imagined I'd ever become.  There probably isn't a cell left in my body that was there the day we kissed.  I came back to that spot once, years later.  I knew what I should feel and I knew what I wanted to feel, but I didn't feel it. It's as if the memory belonged to someone else, to someone that wasn't me. I could have sat anywhere else in the world, any other town would have been just as strange.  I miss you. I miss that moment.

Everything is transitory. There is no self.

but I will always love you