Love is for everyone. No Exceptions.

Ever since I was little, my dad equipped me with the knowledge that I was only allowed to enter a relationship, or have a boyfriend after I finish college. He keeps on pointing out that we were too young for such a feeling. Looking back to what my Dad taught me, is there a thing such as too young or too old for love? Love is not an amusement park ride wherein you need to be a certain age to experience. It is a feeling everybody should be given a chance to feel whether young or old. A philosophy I kept upon experiencing my first love.

When I was in my fourth year high school I was a member of the group NBSB an acronym for No Boyfriend Since Birth, we were eight in our group. All of us were taught by our parents the same “Too Young for Love” philosophy, which we all questioned. It was September 2007 when my friend celebrated her sixteenth birthday together with her older sister’s debut. My only agenda for that evening was to celebrate and hang out with my friends. To my surprise, my friend’s older sister grabbed me towards a tall, Korean looking, well groomed gentleman. My friend’s sister introduced me to him. He reached out his hand and said “Hi. I’m Kenneth.” And that was the beginning of my first love story.

Kenneth and I both played the role of Romeo and Juliet for two years and two months. We would meet secretly for my father was against our relationship. Yet we continued to be lovers despite what my parents keep on insisting. He would wait outside my window just to see a glimpse of me, I would throw romantic letters to him, and he would catch them. Being a romantic guy that he is, he would send me, my sisters, my mother, and our nanny flowers every Valentine’s Day. For me he was perfect, he was the one. He was caring, funny, understanding, patient, sweet, and he made me feel loved. I loved him dearly as well, and on that time I convinced myself that he was my first and last love.

Our memories together were truly one of the best memories I have had in my nineteen years of existence. Yet like most love stories, it is meant to end at some point. Though our love story did not end similarly to Romeo and Juliet’s, and did not turn out the way I hoped it would have ended, I continue to keep my philosophy about love. And despite of what happened to me and my first love, I still love the thought of being in love. My first love made me see that “Love should not be kept from anyone. Love is for everyone.”