All The Girls I've Loved Before

My wife, mother of my children, the love of my life

A grade-school friend that turned into a high-school crush. Teenage hormones did well by her, and not as well by me. I actually took her on a few dates, but my nervousness led me to make mistakes in listening, and eventually she stopped returning my phone calls.

A University crush. She was very lively and interesting, and I wanted to be more than friends, but she did not. We grew apart after she got married - and I was gutted to find out she had gotten MS and died after we lost touch.

My second most serious relationship. I did believe we would end up together before she broke my heart, but nowadays I know we wouldn't have been happy together, so I'm happy we didn't.

This is part of the list where it's not really "love" anymore. Bianca was my first relationship after Lucky and I think I was a bit testy and defensive still - the relationship was more of a fling than anything else.

A singer-songwriter toiling in obscurity with whom I, somewhat inexplicably, had chemistry. I lost my virginity to her.

I was in a kickboxing class full of beautiful women (including #8), many of whom I tried to talk to, but this one was the most beautiful, exotic and mysterious of them all.

I was 25 going on 26, she turned 19 that summer. I think there was a lot of chemistry between us, but not only did the age gap bother me more than a little, I was going away to grad school in September - nothing ever happened between us, but I wonder how it would be viewed by today's standards.

I'd never met anyone as attractive in my personal field of study, not to mention at the graduate level. She could not have been less interested in the likes of me. My usual list of qualities to seek went: smart, pretty and nice - 2 out of 3 ain't bad, I guess.