Do First Loves Last?

I've been thinking a lot lately about first loves. Matt and I have been together almost a year now and I gotta say there's nothing happening in our relationship that makes me think this won't last.

But, I keep hearing things from friends and sometimes I read stuff like, "Well, you know, first loves are really, really wonderful and exciting, but they don't usually last." Last week a friend of mine (I'll call him Downer) said he never knew of a first relationship that survived long-term. He said the younger you are when you fall in love, the less chance there is of that first love lasting.

Downer's reasoning (or maybe it was based on his own experience) is that when you're young and fall in love the first time you really don't have the kind of life experience (I think he called it "maturity") to know how to make things last. "And," he said, "if you're young you are gonna want to get as much experience as possible to see what's out there."

Well, I got to thinking, does he have a point?

Matt and I have been together for just under a year now but what if we're just kidding ourselves in the long run? I mean, neither of us has dated anybody else. How can anybody know with certainty that this thing's going to last?

Sometimes we comment about a hot guy we see on TV, a movie, walking down the street, driving around, etc. We check other guys out when we're together and compare notes. Neither of us does it to make the other jealous. I mean, it's just normal to see a hot guy (they're out there, right?) and say, "Hey, check out that guy." For us boy watching is just, I don't know, innocent fun. We have similar tastes in guys a lot of the time, but sometimes we don't.

I think Downer's perspective is that if you still have raging hormones, you owe it to yourself to give in to them and screw everything in sight. Kinda like sowing your wild oats before you're "mature" enough to settle down.

Personally, I think that's a crock of shit. Sure, I have raging hormones, okay? I admit it. I mean I feel horny like about 23 hours a day!  Sometimes I feel like I want to have sex of some kind every hour on the hour!! Seriously.

Since meeting Matt, sex has been on my mind a lot. So what? Nothing wrong with that. It's what you do with those hormones that matters. I can't imagine saying to Matt, "Hey, you know I love you and like how we're building this life together, but, uh, I hope you understand that I need to go sleep with lots of guys, kiss a lot of frogs, maybe, just to really, really make sure what we have is real."

Am I missing something here?