Keep it simple, stupid

I was attracted to the opposite sex for the first time when I was two-years-old.

No, I don't think I'm exaggerating (or maybe I was two going on three? hmm), believe it or not - I remember having the hugest crush EVER on the son of this lady named Mrs. Burhan, who owned the nursery my parents used to send me to. In fact, I still remember his name, Najib. He was this yummy-looking boy with dark, curly hair and piercing eyes which penetrated the depths of my then two-year-old soul to the very core. Najib was my sister's age; two years older than I was and I felt inadequate and immature next to him. I mean, he was practically a man wasn't he? Everytime he passed by I would hide my milk bottle under my pillow (the nursery would let us lie down and suck on a bottle from time to time for feeding time). We used to watch cartoons together too, sometimes he would smile at me, but he never really fully acknowledged my existance. Whatever. I knew I had bigger fish to fry.

Then when I was four, I had my first 'sorta' boyfriend. My mom's best friend's son, Faizal. He was my age, so we were compatible, of course. I mean, we were on the same wavelength! Although come to think of it, I don't think we said anything to each other much. It was like a 'silent connection' sort of thing, you know? I was staying near the beach in Johor Bahru then and we used to go dating under some trees, while my mom and her bestfriend watched us, from like, 1 metre away. I saved my prettiest dresses for those 'dating under the tree' ocassions and giggled a lot. I think he even tried to hold my hand once. We went our seperate ways soon after, I guess it wasn't meant to be. Thank god, because last I heard, he's married with kids.

Ahh, kindergarten. This was the time when hormones raged and the opposite sex filled my mind 24/7 in between colouring and spelling lessons. Thoughts like 'Did he notice that I put a nice ribbon in my hair today?' and 'Why is he playing swings with that hussy?!' ran through my mind ocassionally when I was interested in someone in particular. Besides having to flush my packed-from-home lunchtime sandwiches down the toilet bowl on a daily basis, I had to deal with how I acted around 5-year-old boys. Life was tough, but I enjoyed every second. Especially when my crush used to follow me around the classroom and mimic every single thing I did. I used to just giggle and snort uncontrollably. I guess giggling was the only thing I used to do back then in front of a boy. Sure, we could have talked about other stuff, like how I thought my mom's strawberry jam sandwhiches were yucky or if he prefered the Orange Cod Liver Oil to the white one (orange!) or which pony in My Little Pony was the prettiest (Lickety Split, duh). But I stuck to giggling coyly. I was a flirty little thing back then, me.

High school was the toughest. I was painfully, painfully shy around boys. These were the years where I had yet to discover contact lenses so I had to wear glasses, yet was too vain to wear glasses so I would bump into things a lot, or ignore someone completely because I couldn't see that person, even if he or she was shouting my name and everyone would stop and stare but I would scuffle away hurriedly and act like I didn't hear anything. Going to an all-girls school made it worse. Boys were like alien creatures to me. I envied the girls in the bus who unbuttoned their baju kurungs and laughed with the boys at the back while I read my Sweet Valley books and kept my legs shut tightly just in case the boys could see anything up my pinafore skirt. Despite all this, I had my first boyfriend then. But it was more of a relationship over the phone, really. At least he used to buy me Famous Amos cookies and Big Macs and place them outside my gate, which was nice.

It was so simple and sweet back then. Then came the phases in my life involving the opposite sex where it gradually got complicated, intense and even more complicated at times, with my fair share of "omg what was I thinking? ugh!" experiences and moments. But at least after all the mumbo jumbo, ups and downs and "it's complicated" relationship statuses on Friendster and Myspace, you learn to appreciate a 'simple and sweet' relationship more when you actually find it again, don't you? And nothing feels better than when you finally get to click the 'In a relationship' button on facebook, hands down. :)