just minishorts.

I received my first bouquet of flowers from an admirer 10 years ago, just around this time that year.

Yea, I, the late bloomer. In school, boys were giving cellophane-wrapped rose stalks to pretty girls since we were in Form 1, and I remember being in Form 2 when I accompanied a classmate to the local gift-shop to purchase a Garfield tea-set to give to this girl from the next class.

In the earlier years I used to scoff at all this 'gift-giving', this 'pointless' dating game that kids in turquoise pinafores and khaki school pants pretended to play. I remember writing to Section Two once, I remember the arrogance in my letter, the one where I said it was silly of teenagers to dabble in the love game.

'What would we know? We can't work, we can't earn a living, and we can't very well afford to give up our studies for love because there's just no future in loving someone at so young an age.'

But the early years soon came to pass, and before long I was envious at my prettier classmates who were being pursued by the older guys. Peer pressure is a strange thing, you know? You start to yearn for things you can actually do without. So it started first, the idea that a boyfriend could give you things you can't afford for yourself. And then the realization that a boyfriend could help you escape early curfews. The rules you could bend yourself around when you have a boyfriend as an excuse.

See when I first started wanting to have a boyfriend, it wasn't because I wanted to be loved, it was because I wanted to break the rules.

Anyway, I had to sit through my entire secondary years before I gained my very first admirer. Unfortunately, he was nothing like the man of my dreams.

To be continued…