Will you go with me? Check yes, no or maybe.

I took the kids to McDonald's today for a treat and some playtime (which is a whole other blog).  As we were sitting there eating our lunch I glanced over at a table with a a girl and a guy sitting there.  They looked like they were in high school.  Well, I noticed that the guy is sitting there chowing down on a burger and the girl is demurely snacking on a fruit and yogurt parfait.  It was obvious they were on some sort of "date".  You know that poor girl was looking at that menu thinking "Dang, I really want the Big Mac", but not wanting to seem uncomely she picks the modest parfait.  So of course I start reminiscing about my dating experiences, limited as they were.  Starting with middle school and the vintage handwritten note stating "Will you go with me?  Check yes, no or maybe", with clever little boxes next to the answers.  I guess because we were so programmed in our short little lives that every decision is multiple choice, with a neat little box holding the answer.  Then on to the torture that is high school dating.  I don't have much to offer here.  I met my first boyfriend in band, he asked me to go with him and I said yes, regardless of whether I felt that way about him or not.  Simply because you were not much without a boyfriend to escort to all the school events.  But a month after we started going out, I chickened out and broke it off.  I just wasn't ready for that kind of attention.  It wasn't until a year later that I was asked out again and this time I was ready.  We met while doing a play together, coincidentally I played his mother.  I remember getting to school early for rehearsal and we were the only two there for a while.  We could cut up and laugh and it was comfortable.  He finally asked me out after the play was over and although I can't remember what we did, I do remember falling hard and fast for him.  There is truly nothing like your first love.  You feel invincible and a happiness that exceeds all other happy feelings you've ever had.  To finally have someone see you above all others for the first time, it's no wonder many think that your first love or teenage love is the most powerful.  Although I can remember one time being invited to have dinner with his parents at his house and they had chicken fingers.  I remember eating like one and a half chicken fingers and saying I was done, even though I was starving.  Silly girls.  Finally I will end with the last dating experience I had which was, of course, when I met Mike.  I was older (22, ha!) and had grown a bit since high school, although many insecurities were still there.  However, with Mike, I didn't feel the need to feed into a lot of those nagging self-criticisms.  On our first date I ordered a quesadilla, not a salad or a plate of steamed vegetables, a Godzilla sized, cheese filled tortilla of love.  It's funny how later in life you adopt a "take me as I am attitude" and how that really pays off in dating, especially when it comes to dinner!  Mike ordered the Captain's Platter, which was a plate piled high with every kind of seafood you can imagine.  By the time I got through one quarter of my quesadilla, I looked up and he had quite literally inhaled the whole plate.  Further proof that guys don't have the same qualms that girls do when it comes to eating in front of other people.  I could write a small novel on the experience of dating Mike, but the one thing I do want to say is that he made me feel like I was in high school all over again, in a good way, a euphoric way.  I suppose the comfort that we felt with each other on that first date is what led to many more and ultimately the best date of all...the wedding date.