To all things there is a beginning.
At times I've attempted to remember the exact point at which my addiction made itself known. Is there an event to which it can be traced, a precise moment in time when I started down the path of sexual addiction that would come to govern my life?
I am sixteen years old, a mall parking lot in Chattanooga, TN. I'm in town visiting relatives. We've done all those Tennessee things--the Chattanooga Choo-Choo, for example. Ruby Falls. Rock City. An incline railway to the top of Lookout Mountain. I am bored, bored, bored. The cousins and I have been released from the adults for the evening. We have been sent off to find our own entertainment while the adults dine at some fancy restaurant.
The cousins and I go to a movie. There are two of them-a boy, seventeen, a girl fifteen. The movie theater is located in a mall. We arrive early and decide to kill some time at Banana Republic. This is back when Banana Republic had a jungle theme, tropical plants everywhere and pants in khaki and olive. There's a boy working there, all done up in jungle gear. He looks like a high school football player sentenced to summer employment at the mall. I've never gone in for the bulkier jocks, with their overblown muscles and underdeveloped minds, but something about this guy immediately gets to me. Looking back, I can't remember exactly what it was. Did he have beautiful eyes, nice hair, exceptionally good manners?
