If I have kissed you I apologise. It was possibly shit.
My first kiss was on a trampoline at Cassi Devine's birthday party. She was a cool kid and everyone in our grade that mattered* was there. I was about sixteen. It was fucking terrible.
This young lad decided that he'd try and pop his digits down my fake snake skin pants after about fifteen seconds of making out. He was strong and handsome and I remember the initial excitement as his mouth pushed into mine. And then I realised that he was PUSHING. I had never kissed anyone before, but I knew that in this maiden exchange I wasn't supposed to feel conquered. Luckily I valued that little basket o' virginal goods and high tailed off the trampoline in time, dignity still contained in those god awful pants. In the peak of a Brisbane heatwave I hid my lust-damaged throat for the following week under a blue turtleneck. If you're reading this El Trampolino, you literally sucked. (And thanks for hooking up with the birthday girl almost immediately after me, swiftly schooling me in the ways of the school representative footballer).
I had a conversation at that party with another young man as he stood, leaning away from the crowd with his back up against the house. He was smoking a cigarette and I said to him that doing so would harm his babies. He had honey skin and a set of big brown deer eyes that caught me by surprise. I wanted to acknowledge his odd composure but I was distracted by my near miss intercourse with ol' mate Mr Trampoline.
It took a few months for us to talk more during class. One day he asked if I wanted to go shopping with him and his mother. I wore a Cat in the Hat shirt and his mum drove us in to the Queen Street Mall. His mum dug my shirt. She loved olives and used to eat them from the jar so for many years to follow I pretended to like them in the hope that I looked as cultured as her. Damn that woman and her casual weekday elegance.
I was almost seventeen when he and I started officially dating. About a week passed after the shopping trip and he asked me if I wanted to take a walk down to the Scarborough shorefront after school. We carved our names into a tree and exchanged stories that still trigger an emotional reaction in me after all this time. As we walked to his bus stop I knew that this kid was seriously special. My first 'real' kiss happened as the bus waited for him to board, his fare awkwardly clasped in his hand that pressed against the small of my back. Is your first love so special because retrospectively you can see that you were naive to the pain of what it was to break up?
Obviously we did break up a few years later. In my first year as a Psychology student I was in no position to successfully diagnose or treat his problems (and nor should I have). I think he got another girl pregnant soon after. I don't even know if he's still alive. I really loved him, and then I really didn't.
So that's a nice story for you.
Fast forward ten years or so and here I am, thinking about all of the kisses between then and now. The few good ones, the few shit ones and the much more common fantasy ones thanks to Joseph Gordon Levitt. I wouldn't mind a kiss. Not like with Mr Trampoline, but like Mr Bus, with focus and connection and intention. Bring back the kisses that stop time.
* And by mattered, I most certainly do not mean by whom was and is most interesting, nor successful in later years.
Cue memories of Hendra - a college pretty much like many others, although we all knew it more as the venue for many God-awful dancing competitions on a stage that sucked and the nightmarish afterwash of a head full of terrible reel music.
ReplyDeleteIt's outside, though, that has been attracted to my frontal lobe as I read these words, and the story in this post. Unlike many of those reading, I genuinely remember the relationship you speak of. I was a few years younger, and remember seeing you guys together, sitting outside on the slope next to Hendra's 'venue'.
I remember watching, (in a non-stalkery way, naturally), somewhere in between waiting for results and kicking someones football into the drain next door for the 4th time, wondering when I was going to have a relationship like that. In the naive absence of the heartache that was to follow, I remember thinking about the concept of having a girl that I would genuinely fall for.
It was a cute thought.
It wasn't until years later, at 21, that I found her. Then, at 23, felt the merciless pangs of relationship disaster.
It's neither as nice or as altogether interesting as your story. But, I thought I'd share it all the same.
Due to the extraneous security settings on my computer, I can't tell if this is a new post or an older one, + this may not post.
ReplyDeleteBut the first paragraph is extremely well written.XD.
And it's so tru: str8 guys always press too hard + use their tongue in a similar fashion, what is with that? Like football I guess.
My first kiss was walking a girl home after grade 7 graduation, in her bathroom. Well, her parents bathroom. But my first 'real' kisses came in grades 8 + 9 between dating different best friends. I can't remember order though. Then there is nothing really till grade 11 + 12.
There is some making out with the same chick as K (really really really drunk on blackberry cooking cherry) and some half remembered hot goth red head who I "broke in" to her bedroom with around 16...BUT,
My first semi-sober make out was (and later GF) was on a trampoline as well. At least I think we dated :S I did fin... that would just be too bizarre if that was you. But my Redcliffe shire parties remain to this day sparse.
I have such fond memories of that trampoline. =D. Except that would be post graduation, which skips Reen, Katey, Michelle. Maybe others. Hmmm. Unless they were the trampoline girl?
The first time I made out with a boy, I don't have to tell you because you were there. I think it was your birthday or something :/ lol. I've been meaning to get these down, for posterity. Obviously sooner would have been better.
Plus there are somethings I have on good authority but do not really remember. I decided not to count them a while ago I realise now. But that is not really legitimate is it, and they will further fade. But if I access them they'll change. Dam you Loftus *shakes fist*.
Omg, in counting that as my first "real" boy kiss: that discounts kisses from 2 other boys. Wait, 3. No 4. Wow. But they hold other titles like "first ever", "first in public", "first initiated", "friend of guy who was there" (not really much of a category). I've just realised that is quite a strange way to frame the encoding of memories.
No wonder I can't track linear time.
And Joseph Gordon Levitt was one of the first TV boys I remember crushing on. Probs why i grew my hair (it was long in 3rd rock for a while).
ReplyDelete