The First Time (Published March 18, 2021)

I am at an exceptionally large house in the Bellaire neighborhood of Los Angeles. In fact, the largest house I had ever been in before or since (a first). No kidding, beer is flowing out of a fountain in the dining room (another first and probably last). It is 1971 and I am at a birthday party for someone I hardly know. And the party has only four of us, or is it six? As I recall the birthday boy had a hired date (also a first and last experience for me). Lots of stories of what happened while in the house, but I am limited in words here so will forego any further embellishment today. I will save it for another writing prompt. After a couple hours in the house, it is time to go to dinner so into a limousine we go. Another first, my first time in a limo. And the driver is named James, no, that cannot be his real name, but it was. We drive to Marina Del Ray for the birthday dinner. A special table in a special room. A nice large room made to seem larger by the fact that there were so few of us. Wine. OK, I might have had Ripple, that fortified wine by Gallo, or even Boone Farm by that time. But another first, French wine. And I am taken by the tasting by the host and the rejection of the bottle and then later a second bottle. Perhaps it was just a to impress in that in all my wine drinking this past fifty years I can only recall sending back one, maybe two, bottle of wine. No, I do not remember all that I had for dinner that night. But I do remember another first, and it is this first that caused me to think of this story. I had an artichoke for the first time. I really did not know how to eat it and I tried to follow the leader. I was feeling like a young child watching intently while the adult did something and then I tried to copy. All I know is that I ended up eating parts of that artichoke that I now realize are discarded. I remember it so well as my lacerated throat was sore for several days after. This was like many firsts in life that you do not soon forget.

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