The Part Where I Had My First Kiss

My first kiss story can beat the pants off of most anybody's.  With first kisses, I have good luck.  My first kiss ever was good, my first french kiss was good, and my first kiss with a girl was very good.  I didn't realize until later that I'm super lucky that one of those was good.  All three?  I am some kind of statistical anomaly.  And okay, yeah, I'm aware that for some people all three of those happen with the same person or even on the same night.  Mine were spread out over about a year and a half.

I was sixteen years old.  Paul Bunyon was my second boyfriend, but the first that my parents knew about.  We met doing theatre.  He was a techie and I was an actor.  He actually remembers how we met a lot better than I do.  I don't remember the conversations he says we had, but I also have a notoriously terrible memory.  Especially around shows.

One day he asked me out.  He had probably been working up the courage for awhile.  I remember we were like...in the middle of the hallway or something.  It's not as weird as it sounds!  I had kind of had a thing for him (but I was a little more focused on someone else...if I'm going to be honest with myself).  Anyway, he asked me if I was doing anything on Saturday night and if I would like to go to the Symphony with him.

Side note: I am a sucker when it comes to the Symphony.  I have gone on dates with I think five different people to the Symphony.

And so, even though my best friend's birthday party was Saturday night and I had already RSVP'd "yes" I told him I'd love to go with him.

And that was my first date.  Ever.

There's this picture of us before we left (because my parents were typical parents and took pictures) and I look like a total loon.  I'm grinning from ear to ear, thrilled to death.

You know, I always tell Mormon youth that turning sixteen is not some magic pill that automatically means people will start asking you on dates.  But it sure was for me.  Within turning sixteen I was asked out by four different guys and had two different boyfriends.

(Also I apologize right now if this is starting to get incoherent.  I started writing this post a couple days ago and just now came back to it and I'm really jittery and hyperactive because I took some pain meds.  But I can't sleep for the aforementioned reasons so I will carry on writing anyhow.)

Anyway, so after our first date Paul Bunyon and I became an official couple.  Actually, we made plans for a second date and then became an official couple.  Our second date was to go see his sister in her school's production of Fiddler on the Roof.  We decided to make it a double date.  Well, I decided to.  I was still a very good Mormon at that point and had been counseled for as long as I could remember to start dating in groups or at least on double dates.  So I think it was some combination of me wanting to do the "right thing" and my parents being like, "Um, hey.  Why don't you see if some friends want to go?"

Well as luck had it, I was friends with this really awesome couple.  They were one of those couples who were fun as individuals so you put them together and it was like a dynamite package of fun.  Hanging out with them didn't feel like hanging out with a couple, it felt like hanging out with fun in a can.  (Okay yeah I think the drugs are affecting my cognitive processes.  Not only did I write that sentence but I think it's a good one.)  They had both gone to the school that Paul Bunyon's sister went to, so I asked if they wanted to double with us.

Incidentally, half of that couple was Doricha.

So we saw the play (Paul Bunyon's sister was my favorite part, of course).  Afterwards, we went back to Doricha's house to hang out some more.  We played this game called Curses.  What you do is you draw these cards with challenges on them.  Things like "talk in a French accent" or "put your hands on your head and don't take them off."  If someone caught you not doing one of your challenges, they would ring a bell on you.

I drew one that said that I had to tell anybody who rang the bell that I loved them.  So first Doricha rang the bell and I professed my absolute and undying love for her on one knee.  (Haha this is an even funnier story now than when it happened.)  Then her boyfriend rang the bell and I declared my love for him (very carefully so that his girlfriend wouldn't beat me up).

Then my boyfriend rang the bell.  And we had only been dating for, what, a week?  I couldn't tell him I loved him.  That would be weird and lying.

So I kissed him.