The Way We Weren't

"The Way We Weren't" is the 20th episode of The Simpsons ' fifteenth season. The episode aired on May 9, 2004.

Plot
In the morning Bart tricks Milhouse and Ralph into doing chores in the front yard. Sherri and Terri appear and introduce them to their "boy-crazy cousin who thinks Bart is cute" and they go to play spin the bottle in Bart's treehouse. Milhouse gets to kiss the girl, but she backed away and he accidently kissed Homer. Then Homer and Bart fight over the use of a beer bottle Milhouse wanted to use (the beer actually landed "safely" into Homer's mouth, who drank it while napping), it lands them in the Simpson family court, with Lisa presiding as judge.

Marge, giving a testimony, tells the kids that when she was in high school, she had her first kiss with Homer, but Homer confesses that it was not his first kiss. Homer recalls that when he was 10, he went to a camp for underprivileged boys, Camp See-A-Tree, where Homer meets Lenny, Carl, and as a counselor, Moe. It turns out the summer camp is more like a prison and they go to work in the kitchen at a rich girls' camp across the lake. Homer finds a retainer and returns it to the girl who lost it, though he cannot see her (they are separated by the kitchen wall). She wants Homer to see her later that night. He does so, even though due to an accident with a switchblade he is wearing an eye patch. He tells Bart and Lisa that she was the prettiest girl he had ever met until he later met their mother, but Marge admits that she was that girl Homer met, and if she'd known that he was that boy al those years ago then she never would have married him.

Marge gives her side of the story, saying that she was with Patty and Selma, Helen Lovejoy, Luann Van Houten and Cookie Kwan at their camp, "Camp Land-A-Man". At camp, Marge burns her hair with an iron by accident, turning it brown and she explains that is why Homer did not recognize her in high school. She meets Homer (who gives her a false name, Elvis Jagger Abdul-Jabbar) and they kiss. They agree that the following night they will meet again, but Homer does not come. Marge mentions that she could not trust another boy for years.

Homer says he did not return for another date because he fell off a cliff into the lake and drifted to a fat camp, "Camp Flab-Away", which counted Mayor Quimby, Chief Wiggum and Comic Book Guy as its participants, the directors refused to believe he wasn't ateending the camp and strap him into an excercise belt machine for hours. Although Homer escapes the fat camp and makes his way to Marge's camp, Marge has left the camp only seconds before he arrives. When he arrives he was told by Marge's sisters that she hates him, Homer says that what they had was special. Patty kisses Homer and asks sarcasstically if that was special, to which Homer says no.

Marge now knows the truth and forgives him, but she thinks that Homer won't be able to preserve their love for long. Homer disproves it by showing half of the heart shaped stone he kept. Marge also kept hers (though for different reasons), and the two kiss until the light fades.

Awards
This episode was nominated for an Emmy in the Outstanding Animated Program (for programming less than one hour) selection.