November 26, 2004

My First Real Kiss, and the Subsequent Trauma

This kind of came up over at Casey's page. I asked her to post about who gave her her first real kiss, and what she knows about him now. I referenced my own experience, and she wanted to hear the story. So here goes.

Let's first keep in mind that I was a Jehovah's Witness until I forced them to kick me out at the age of 21. Because of that, I grew up under a blanket of innocence. I couldn't go to school dances, I couldn't play sports, and I sure as hell couldn't get involved with someone of the opposite sex, particularly if they weren't a JW.

With that all in mind, it was a miracle of sorts that my mother allowed me to ride the team bus up to the state basketball tournaments, with my friends (the cheerleaders). On the way back down, there was a boy sitting beside me. We were friendly and all, but I was snug in my sixteen year-old innocence blanket and never really thought about him from a lustful standpoint. Next thing I know, he's holding my hand there in the dark. Well, this was probably the pivotal point in my whole life. Religiously speaking, it was all downhill from there. Why? Because it felt pretty good. I liked sitting there, holding this guy's hand. Then he reached over, turned my chin toward him, and he kissed me. That still rates as a pretty darn good kiss. The second one was even better.

After that bus ride, I wigged out from religious guilt. I can't actually remember if I confessed my sin or not, but I had to give this boy the whole spiel of, "I can't date you because I'm a Jehovah's Witness and we're not allowed to date until we're ready to get married." (I sort of wish I had pictures of the weird looks I got from boys/men up until I quit saying that and switched over to, "Take me, big fella.")

Where is he now? Well, Matt came home from work one day and jokingly said, "I ran into an ex-boyfriend of yours today." I said, "Oh?" He said yes, and named this boy. I laughed and explained that this guy was the one who gave me my first kiss. The look Matt gave me was very similar to the one I mentioned above. I said, "What?" Matt told me that this guy weighs about a buck twenty-five now, has a long, greasy pony-tail, scabs on his face, and appears to be badly hooked on methamphetimine. Sad, huh? Ah, those innocent days of long ago...