How old were you

Journal Jar - How old were you when you had your first date? Describe it...

I was 16 years old.  A family friend decided that it was his job to give me a good first date...what a disaster.  I wonder though how long it would have been before I had a date if not for him.  Joel Christiansen from Star Idaho....I don't remember how we knew them before their son (Joel's brother) was sleeping across the laps in a truck and somehow turned over opening the door and falling out and under the tires thus having to have his arm amputated.  Anyway back to the date.  I believe in obeying the prophet which is one good reason I didn't date before I was 16.

 Joel picked me up and then picked up a friend of his for a double date because that also was encouraged by the prophet.  The problem was that the double daters need to be carefully chosen or else it can be very awkward.  Bowling and ice cream from an ice cream parlor was fun (at least I think it was bowling, I know we had ice cream) the problem is that Joel and I were just friends with no romantic thought and his friend was taking advantage of sitting in the back seat of a car.  Well, that was it. Now when I think back to dating at all I am amazed that I got married.  The best dates I went on were snorkeling (where I almost drowned, and am embarrassed to say I borrowed a roommates cutoffs that were uncomfortably short) hiking up Mt Timpanogas (which I was condemned for because it was overnight - girls tent, guys tent) and the guy in both of those actually was dating his wife to be at the same time as I.  Then there were the dates with Gerald ... the first was luckily not a date ... he asked me to go to a company dinner (the host was our Bishop, it was great food , and I met Gerald's parents - in a situation that was very comfortable and non threatening which was a tender mercy of our Father in Heaven because I had a hard time being myself on a "date")  The second date I again didn't think of as a date so again I was happy in ignorance...Gerald invited me to the state fair.  Now I call it our first petting date because I enjoyed petting the lambs, cows, and even pigs.  I was relaxed until our little fingers brushed ... it frightened me a bit because of the electricity of feelings that passed between us.  Then he took me to a restaurant and we ordered a fairly expensive dinner, a very expensive dinner and then it dawned on me that it really was a date.  (The main reason I didn't recognize it right off is because we spent quite a bit of time together, he ate with our apartment, we took walks etc.)   One flaw in me was that I spent most of my dates trying to figure out how to get rid of them.....not a good way to get to know someone.

   

 No wonder ..

I learned to run very well....