MY FIRST DATE

By Philip M. Lustre Jr. 

(N.B. This is part of "my first" series. I originally posted this essay more than a year ago. For my new friends, especially the young and the not so young. Please care to read.)

I must confess I started it at an early age. I was 14 when I had my first girlfriend. It was in the summer of 1968, when I met a comely woman, wooed her, and savored the presence of the fairer sex.

I always consider it as one of the better things that happened in my life.
I was an incoming high school sophomore when a friend introduced me to a morena beauty, who lived a dozen houses away from ours in Tondo.

She was of the same age as mine, although she was older by five months. She was big and bosomy for her age and this could be the reason I fell for her.

I was so mesmerized by her pair of sparkling eyes and dark but smooth and glistening skin. During those days, I wasn't attracted to mestizas, as I always preferred morenas.

Audacious at my early age, I invited her for our first date. She probably felt I was irresistible enough and she obliged. We set our first date on a Saturday.

Armed with five pesos, which I surreptitiously filched from my mother's wallet, we took a jeepney ride to a place, which was then so popular among dating couples - Luneta Park.

Dating during those days was so different from what we know today.

Couples hardly dared to go beyond the limit for we knew the consequences of being irresponsible.

We followed the conventional idea of dating, which was more of a getting-to-know-you thing. We didn't go to the extreme.

Moreover, the likes of Anito Lodge and Victoria Court were not yet around during those days and I had no idea of a short time.

But my first date was more of a comedy of errors.

During those days, Luneta was undergoing a drastic facelifting. It was one of the priority projects of then first lady Imelda Marcos.

I asked my date to sit with me on a newly laid lawn. The bermuda grass smelled so sweet and we could't help but feel its charm and caress its beauty.

Then a gardener came and barked us to get out of the lawn. "Boy, bawal diyan (boy, it's prohibited there)," he said with an air of authority.

I felt so offended because he called me a boy. I felt at that time that I could impregnate a dozen women and yet, he had the temerity to call and treat me as a boy.

I wanted to punch him straight on the nose.

We moved to an unrestricted lawn and sat there for a long time as I could remember. We exchanged stories and jokes and talked and talked the whole night.

Then, an idea flashed into my young mind. I recalled the advice of my 18 year-old cousin, who was my confidante during those days.

He told me never to hesitate what I thought I should do when dating a woman.

I grabbed her hand, but she recoiled obviously because she was so surprised at my initiative. To be honest, I didn't know how to hold a woman's hand.

I looked as if I was catching a slippery catfish when I took her hand. I was so amateurish. I lacked the finesse of a gigolo.

But sanity finally prevailed and she allowed me to hold her hands. Since this was the first time I went on a date and held a woman's hand, I felt as if I was on cloudnine.

The night passed. We quietly parted ways and went home.

The school opened and classes resumed. I got busy with my schoolworks.

She too got busy. We didn't have a fight. But the heavy school workload took a toll on us.

We drifted apart and never met again. It was a brief summer fling, but I remember it vividly.