How it all began for me-Sarah

For me, it all began at my local watering hole, in August 2008, albeit VERY subtly. I received the first book for my 24th birthday. VAMPIRES?! I scoffed... Surely you must be dilusional, friend who bought this for me! Do I look like the type to read something so fantastical? I think not.

Months passed and I didn't give Twilight much more thought. Oh sure I saw pictures of Rob here and there, in fact, when I first saw a piece of the Twilight trailer on TV I thought the beautiful man was Ed Westwick (Gossip Girl's Chuck Bass)... and at the time Westwick gave me the heebie jeebies.

One day I caught my friend/co-worker's mom in the waiting room of the veterinary clinic I work in, reading IT. I found myself asking her about the books-she was an absolute twi-hard. I couldn't get my head around this. Someone in their late fifties was enjoying these books? What WAS it? A few weeks later, I was in Australia for one of my very best friend's engagement party. I remember the exact moment, in the car with another friend, Agatha, driving to the train station in Frankston, Victoria. "Don't think I'm totally lame but... have you read/watched any of the twilight saga?", she asked suddenly. I took a deep breath and stared at her for a second to ensure she wasn't joking-definitely wasn't joking, in fact, her face was so serious I almost had to laugh. We talked about it for a few moments and then changed the subject... man what is WITH everyone, I wondered.

After my two weeks were up, and I was on the plane, LA bound, I began flicking through all the on-demand movies-there were several I was excited to watch during my 15 hour flight home... and then there was Twilight. I'll admit, I wasn't excited to see it, but I was ridiculously curious at this stage. Agatha, just a year younger than me, almost a lawyer and very similar to me loved the series, Mel's mom, a fifty something year old, was obsessed... how bad could it be? I figured it would be less painful to see the movie than to read the book, less time out of my life spent on vampires. So, I watched... I was gripped by it the entire time, in love with Edward, obsessed with the story, curious how ridiculously pasty the film was, and... confused. What had I missed?

A few days after returning home, I watched it again, and then again, trying to disect it mentally, trying to figure out why Edward was looking at Bella this way and that way and why this and that were happening... and then I got my mom to watch it with me. THEN, firmly deciding my eyes were not deceiving me, that it was the movie, slacking off I realized it was time to read the damn books. If they weren't as good as the movie, I could always stop with the first one. So, I danced off to Target one day and scooped up Twilight... and then New Moon... I held Twilight in my left hand and New Moon in my right, toying between them, as Eclipse and Breaking Dawn stared back at me from the shelves-I hemmed and hawed-should I just read New Moon since I'd already seen Twilight? Maybe then I could get through it all faster (I'm often a reader-cheater). No, I decided-that would be stupid, I had to read Twilight as well. After staring at them for a good ten minutes I heard myself sigh outloud, 'ah well, might as well just get them all in one go...' I turned on my heel and darted back towards the registers, hiding the books under a box of tampons and a sports bra thinking, 'if the first one sucks you can just return the rest'.

I got home and shut myself away with new moon... ok what the hell is going on? THAT didn't happen in the Twilight so why...?! Why is Jasper controlling her emotions, WHAT!? Damnit!... So I closed New Moon after a couple of chapters and opened Twilight. Then that was it-you couldn't talk to me. I was lost in a world of vampires, rain and werewolves. I was up until 3 or 4 am reading some nights. I was reading on my lunch break. I was reading the second I got in the door from work. Sometimes I even got up a little early and read before work. I think it took a total of three weeks, during the month of June, to read all four books, and what was available of midnight sun on Stephenie Meyer's website. If I wasn't reading, I was researching.... researching what, Sarah? It's a freaking story! Researching plenty! Researching tidbits, deleted bits, ideas, backgrounds, actors... ACTORS. Upon researching I realized I had seen Nikki Reed, Cam Gigandet, JACKSON RATHBONE, Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, Peter Facinelli, Elizabeth Reaser, Kellen Lutz and Edi Gathegi in other things! Wow, if only I had known then, what I know now.

One day, as I was finishing up Breaking Dawn, my sister came over... she had been warned that I wouldn't talk to her because I'd be busy reading, and I couldn't be torn away (it was physically impossible). Her curiousity was peaked, as mine had been, over the hype... but like me, she was also very uniterested in the subject. She flipped through a chapter or two of twilight after I shoved it at her in an attempt to get her to shut up as well so I could read in peace (plus, i wanted someone to share in my obsession). She agreed it was good but that she wasn't that into it and couldn't get Peter Facinelli, RPattz and KStew out of her head while reading. I suggested she take it home, she forgot it but a few days later took it home and called me squealing later that night! Yippee! I'd created an evil spawn! She became even more obsessed than me, and I relished in that.

It was a twi-summer.

x
S
Next up, Meeting Jackson Rathbone :D