Feels Like the First Time (29 page)

At that moment, I paused and thought back to the summer evening when she had told me she loved me again. Still.

“Dawn Adele,” I said. “Until I draw my last breath, I will never leave you.”

Darren said the words I had been waiting all my life to hear. “You may kiss your bride.”

I did.

We exited the hall to Stevie Ray Vaughan’s
The House is Rockin (Don’t Bother Knockin’).
We were older, but we weren’t dead. Plus, we thought it would embarrass our kids.

We stood outside the hall in the late afternoon sunshine and soaked in the love and good wishes from our friends. I was so happy to see my friends, Bob and Karen Lichtenwalter, who had driven all the way from Maine to attend our ceremony. We didn’t have much in the way of family there, outside of our kids, but several of my relatives from my real dad’s side of the family made the drive. It thrilled me to see them.

When we went back inside the hall, we had our first dance as a married couple. We had gone back and forth for months over what song we should dance to first. We had initially thought Heatwave’s
Always and Forever
would be ideal, but eventually realized that it reminded us a little too much of some of the hard times we had gone through. A few months before the wedding we were driving down I-5 together when The Hollies’
The Air That I Breathe
came on the radio. We knew we didn’t need to look any further.

As that unmistakable opening chord played, I proudly held Dawn’s hand and we walked onto the deserted dance floor. I held her close and thought back to our other memorable dances together. I had first discovered I had feelings for her while dancing to
Stairway to Heaven
at my sixteenth birthday party. I knew I had fallen in love with her on the floor of Hollywood Hollywood. Of course, I would never forget dancing barefoot in the living room of the trailer on Prom night.

Every dance together was a step for us, and this was a big one. I stared deeply into Dawn’s hazel eyes and smiled with complete contentment.

When I was a young man, I thought the word
contentment
meant settling, giving up. It was only at that moment, watching Dawn as she moved gracefully around the room in her wedding gown, that I realized that contentment could be so good. It was peace. It was an absence of fear. It was the best feeling I had ever known.

By the end of the evening, the crowd dwindled to a few old friends we went to school with, our kids, and our KISS II family. They helped us load our presents and divide up the leftover food and wine. Then they swept and mopped the hall so we would get our deposit back.

Your friends will come to your wedding. Your family will be there to sweep up afterward.

When we were finally ready to go, we walked outside to see that the kids had decorated our car for the honeymoon. They had attached some sexy lingerie to the front grille, condoms to the antenna, and written “Dirty Old Man” on my side of the car. Their artwork eventually saved us a speeding ticket in Oregon. We were doing 50 MPH in a 35 MPH zone and got pulled over. But when the cop came to the window he said, “Slow it down a little bit, lovebirds,” and let us go.

When I first asked Dawn to marry me, I had hoped that the real estate market would turn around enough to take her on a dream trip for our honeymoon–maybe Hawaii or Tahiti. As 2010 went on and the sales didn’t materialize, I realized that was a pipe dream. At one point, I told Dawn our honeymoon might be spent at the Motel 6 in Tukwila. She said she didn’t care. You’ve gotta love an understanding woman.

Several months before the wedding, the Weibles came through for us again. They told me they had a timeshare and wanted to let us use it as a wedding present. Thanks to them, our honeymoon was saved. The way their timeshare worked, we didn’t have to choose just one place to stay–we could split our nights up however we wanted. Jerry, Lynn and I had a wonderful time figuring out how we would spend their points. We decided on a tour of California that included stops in Clear Lake, Oceanside and Anaheim.

By the time we got on our way, it was past 9 pm. We still needed to stop in Chehalis so we could change out of our wedding finery and back into civilian clothes. I loved wearing my tuxedo at the wedding, but when I changed into my Beatles T-shirt, jeans, and tennis shoes, I felt more like myself.

We spent our first day as husband and wife driving down the Oregon Coast on Highway 101. It was a lovely blue-sky-and-sunshine day, with the ocean as our constant companion. We listened to music, audio books, and the sound of breaking waves. Mostly we decompressed after a stressful few weeks.

When we pulled into Oceanside three days later, it felt like we were coming home even though neither one of us had ever been there before. Our original plan was to use Oceanside as a base of operations for forays into San Diego, just a short drive to the south. As soon as we wandered into Oceanside, we forgot all about San Diego. We were so charmed by the city, we never wanted to leave.

Oceanside has a terrific sandy beach, and even though it was late October, the water was warm enough to swim in. Mrs. Inmon and I went swimming everyday alongside the pier. We might as well have been teenagers again. We swam and wrestled and practiced body surfing. It occurred to me that our honeymoon in 2010 wasn’t much different from the same honeymoon we would have had if we had gotten married in 1979.

Standing in the warm water, laughing and hopelessly in love, I knew life couldn’t ever get any better.

And yet it does. Every day. 

Afterword –

Whatever’s Written In Your Heart

This book is the story of finding your true love, losing her, and being lucky enough to find her again. It’s also about perspective.
Perspective is everything.
If Dawn and I had been able to marry in 1979, we would still be married. We would be happy and have a lifetime of memories to go with our love. But we wouldn’t have the gift of perspective we now enjoy. I don’t know if we would have the same appreciation for each other without the gift of knowing what our lives would be like without each other.

In the end, our life is the sum of the choices we make, large and small, every day. 

Acknowledgments

I received an education while writing this book. I have been lucky to find so many helpful, intelligent, insightful people, both professionally and personally. Thanking them here seems like a pale compensation for all they’ve given me, but it is what I have to give. I feel a great depth and sincerity of appreciation for:

Chris Guthrie, Open Book Editors – When I first met Chris, I had a story in search of a book. Through his consistent, thoughtful efforts, he helped me break many of the bad writing habits I started with (those remaining are my fault, not his) and helped me shape this book in more ways than I can count.

J.K. Kelley – I hired J.K. to proofread the manuscript and be the final set of eyes before publication. He caught all my errant commas and misplaced italics, but he did much more for me as well. He turned the dry art of proofing into further lessons in writing that I will carry with me into my next book and beyond.

Linda Boulanger, Tell~Tale Book Covers – Linda was infinitely patient and always full of fun creative ideas for the way the book looks. It was her idea to show the two couples in silhouette on the front and back cover that so perfectly captures the innocent essence of the story. She also formatted the book to look great whether you’re holding pages in your hand or it is displayed on your e-reader.

Weeb Heinrich, WritingRaw.com – If Weeb hadn’t started WritingRaw.com and published the earliest drafts, I don’t know how my story would have made it into Dawn’s hands. Weeb was supportive and encouraging at a time I needed it most.

It took me five and a half years to write this book. At various stages I had beta readers who looked the manuscript over and offered input and criticism. For the first three of those years, my sister Terri, was the only person who knew I was writing it, and she was my constant conspirator. Later, my most-helpful readers were Karen Lichtenwalter, Bob Mckean, Sherry Eddy, Alice Guenther, Jeff Hunter, Sharil Simmons, Tim Hudson, Lois Walker and Heather Brush. I owe them all a debt of gratitude.

I would also like to thank the teachers of Mossyrock High School, especially Dayton Grimes, Dennis Merz, Lynn Warfield and Jim Bartee. They taught me so much.

Finally and most importantly, I’d like to thank the love of my life, Dawn Adele Inmon, and our five gorgeous daughters: Desi, Connie, Samy, Dani and Brina. I love you all.

About the Author

Shawn Inmon is originally from Mossyrock, a very small town in rural Washington State. He used Mossyrock as the setting for
Feels Like the First Time
.

He has been a real estate broker in Enumclaw Washington for the last twenty years. Prior to that, he worked as a short-order cook, travelling T-shirt salesman, radio DJ, Cutco Cutlery sales rep, department store buyer, video store manager, crab fisherman, Kirby vacuum cleaner salesman, business consultant and public speaker. Shawn has often said that he learned everything he needed in life by having 400 different jobs.

He married his high school sweetheart Dawn thirty one years after he first asked her for her hand. Together, they have five daughters, five grandchildren and two chocolate labs named Hershey and Sadie.

If you'd like to see pictures of the people and places Shawn wrote about in
Feels Like the First Time,
please visit the photos page on his website:
http://www.ShawnInmon.com/photos
.

Shawn would also like to invite you to drop in at his Facebook page:
http://www.Facebook.com/shawninmonwriter
.

Finally, if you'd like to send Shawn a message directly, his email address is
[email protected]
. He’d love to hear from you.

And on a personal note, Shawn would like to say:
Thank you so much for taking the time to read my book.