Dreamy days of 1994

After an old high school sweetie invited me to dinner tomorrow night, I spent about 30 minutes today searching for this photo.

Homecoming 1994. I was 17. I asked for a wrist corsage. I got a pin-on. I loved my dress. I had a huge crush on my date.

Michael smoked cigarettes, bagged groceries and drove a green truck. He was a nice guy with a good sense of humor who made me smile. He was a year older than me and didn't go to my school. I thought he was dreamy.

I don't remember how we met, but I remember volunteering to go to the Brookshire's for anything my mother needed just to see if he was working and flirt. I would have been so mad if you told me back then that I was chasing him.

At some point, phone numbers were exchanged, and plans were made.

I took him to a bonfire out in the country where we had our first kiss. It was cold outside and he was warm. The embers on the edge of the fire in my friend's front yard melted the rubber soles of my boots. We held hands in the back of his friend's Oldsmobile Ninety Eight.

Mom liked him. She let me take the BMW when he and I went on a double date, the boys taking swigs from a flask in the back seat. I can't remember if I let him drive. The other couple didn't go out again.

Michael is the only guy I dated that my brother advised to be good to me or else. I have no idea what my brother would have done to defend my honor. I was touched by the gesture all the same.

Just as hazy as my memory is about how we met, I cannot remember how we parted. Surely it wasn't bitter. That's the beauty of time. I try to think back and just shrug. I should have kept a journal.

What I do know is that I laugh when I look back, and I always think fondly of him and that pin-on corsage. It really wasn't so bad.

I can't wait to hear what he remembers from 1994.

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