The First One who Broke my Heart

The Shaun Cassidy of my youth

Fridays at 7:30 PM. I remember so well when the ‘Hardy Boys’ series was on TV, starring Shaun Cassidy and Parker Stevenson. Everyone in my family will attest to my crazed obsession with Shaun Cassidy. When my sister visited my aunt in New York before I lived here, they had a chance to watch him on the Broadway play Blood Brothers and giggled through the whole show remembering.

I collected his records – in vinyl, nonetheless and they’re still at home at my parent’s house with the life-sized poster that came with the first album. It used to hang in my bedroom among many other fan paraphernalia I had collected – Tigerbeat magazines included. In 1979 he got married to Playboy playmate Ann Pennington and I cried for a week. Thereafter, that embarrassing chapter of my youth I hoped I had closed and moved on.

On Friday, at dinner with my girlfriends we started exchanging stories about our first heartbreak. Always the one who will shift the discussion from sad and dramatic reminiscence, I had to share ‘my life’ with Shaun Cassidy. I volunteered and divulged stories from that significantly psychotic period of my life. We were laughing so hard I am sure we were a tad away from being kicked out of the restaurant.

And after they thought they’d heard enough, as we were walking home I remembered something. I took out my ipod and played a song that I shared with everyone. It was Da Doo Ron Ron Ron by Shaun Cassidy. Six women then resumed a laughing marathon at the corner of 3rd Avenue and 79th Street at 1AM.


Three times married, twice divorced; this is Shaun Cassidy now.

One tiny note: In November 25, 1981 Shaun’s daughter Caitlin Ann was born. Three years later on the same date I had Nicole. I only found out about it today as I was searching the internet for Shaun Cassidy’s pictures.