Of roses and first kisses

Roses are red

Violets are blue

Sugar is sweet

And so are you....

There was a time when all I ever wanted was a relationship. I use the term to refer to romantic relationships, here.

Ever since I was thirteen, all I have done is try to find love. Now, you can psychoanalyse that all you want. Maybe I was not loved enough as a child; my emotional needs were not met, etc. etc. But all of that doesn't change what happened. And back then I was not aware enough to understand what I was doing, let alone why I was doing it.

I remember my first kiss clearly. It was awkward to say the least! I was 14 or 15, and I was riding home on the bus, when suddenly this boy who was my "boyfriend" back then, leaned into me and kissed me - more like pecked me - really quickly on the lips. Startled, I jerked my head back and slammed into the window pane. Luckily nothing happened to my head or the window. But I finally understood what a kiss was. Or at least got my first impression of what it was possibly like. That electric shock-like feeling, that surge of blood through your veins, that insanely rapid heartbeat... it never changes. Especially that first kiss. 

He gave me a rose one day. A very large and beautiful, red rose. I was home studying for the board exams, and he was on his way to school (he was in the grade below mine) and he had asked me to come to the bus stop, so he could give me this beautiful flower through the bus window - the same one  that I slammed by head into, yes. I was so happy and felt so loved.

Back then my dad would collect whisky bottle boxes (essentially, he never threw things away which is why they became "collections"). I think it was Johnny Walker or one of those nice ones, whose empty box I found and then used to store the rose in. I actually had wanted to press it between the pages of a book, but it was so large that I couldn't squish it into a book. So I put it into a box. And stuck it to the insides with cello-tape. 

You know, I forgot about the rose in the box eventually, and it sat there in my Godrej cupboard for years. And one day, finally, about 20 or more years later, I threw it away.

What, you thought this was going to be a story about a high-school romance that ended in marriage? Well, sure we got married... just not to each other. In fact, we broke up when I moved to another school. I did keep that rose though.... all those years.