Give Us a Kiss
I have been really embarrassed about something for many years. I don’t like to talk about it that much so not very many people know about it. I need to move past it so I’ve decided that I’m going to share this embarrassing moment with you today so that one of two things will happen. Either I will realize that it’s not uncommon and move on with my life or I will realize that I am a freak and promptly find a psychiatrist who will help me learn from this experience and then move on.
I’m talking about my first real kiss. It was awful! I had no idea what I was doing and I made it a really gross experience for me and the boy involved. I must confess that I was at least 16 years old before I got my first kiss, not extremely young but it could be worse. I had kissed guy friends in the past but it was the kind of kiss you give to your grandma (if you kiss your grandma on the lips, which I never did) when you are saying goodbye. Mostly we thought we were being funny and just joking around.
I know you want to hear every last detail about it and I’m more than happy to share them with you. Go back to 1987 (Yikes!) I’m a sophomore in high school and I’m dating this guy named… uh… Brence (names have been changed to protect the sloppy kissers) and we are having a good time on what is somewhere between our 2nd and 3rd date. I don’t remember what we did that night but as he pulls up into my driveway I can feel the tension begin to build. Is he going to kiss me? Do I want him to? Am I going to do it right?
Brence leans over, I pucker up just like I’m going to kiss my grandma and suddenly I feel like I’m drowning in the biggest, wettest, sloppiest lips ever known to man (or woman). Alarm bells are going off in my head, my brain is yelling “You’re not doing this right!” and “This is really disgusting!” I quickly end the kiss with what I’m sure is a crazy, smacking, pucker thing and I say something like “Thanks for the nice evening” and I run into the house. I’m sure he was quite relieved that he didn’t have to walk me to the door after that fiasco. I didn’t mention that kiss to anyone but he must have because a few days later a girl in my ward came up to me and asked with a big smirk on her face, “When John kissed you the other night was that your first kiss?”
I’m sorry to say that my kissing life didn’t get much better for a little bit. The next kissing experience I had was pretty embarrassing too. When the guy went to kiss me he leaned into his right and I leaned to my left which was awkward so he pulled back. Then he leaned to his left and I leaned to my right which was just as bad. He leaned back and said, “Don’t worry about it Kristen, it’s ok.” He then left and that was our last date. Not long after that I left for the BYU where I had a few very good teachers help me out on my kissing techniques.
So, should I remain embarrassed and get professional help or do have an embarrassing story to share with me so I’ll feel better about myself?
I think we’ve all learned a valuable lesson here — go into a first kiss with someone with your EYES OPEN (literally and figuratively). That was my secret… That is half of the reason why our first kiss was such a home run and why you were putty in my hands from the beginning.
(And to think you teased me for being an eyes-open kisser when we dated. Mwahhahaha!! That was my secret all along — and now you’re stuck with me!)
Comment by Geoff J — September 2, 2005 @ 1:46 pm
The good ole open mouth on closed mouth kiss…
…and I second Geoff’s open-eye advise.
Comment by J. Stapley — September 2, 2005 @ 2:01 pm
I just remember she tasted like bubble gum.
Comment by don — September 2, 2005 @ 3:52 pm
Does anyone have a good first kiss?
I must’ve been 16 too. It was in the woods behind out school. That sounds creepy doesn’t it. The horrible thing about it? I laughed when he tried to kiss me. Nervous laughter, you know. Poor guy.
Last I heard he was dating a supermodel, or something.
Comment by Susan M — September 2, 2005 @ 5:55 pm
I remember my first kiss. It was hot. I remember my last kiss…it was far too long ago. (sigh)
Which makes me think it’s not the first kiss, but the last kiss that matters most.
Don’t feel bad, kristenj, Bence is to blame. Going in mouth open on an innocent girl like you. Shame on him.
Comment by SeptimusH — September 2, 2005 @ 9:52 pm
Well I’ll be…all these years I’ve been embarrassed and it was really Brence’s fault. Maybe I should go find him and open up a can of whoop @$#!
Comment by Kristen J — September 2, 2005 @ 10:04 pm
I was told by the first girl I kissed that I was pretty unskilled, too. (Hopefully it wasn’t as unpleasant for her as your first experience, but she did use the word “sloppy”./shudder/ I apologize collectively for all us Brences/Johns, and echo Septimus’s injunction to not blame yourself!)
Funny thing is, this first kiss was about a month before I left on my mission. (I know, pitiful.) However, the first girl I kissed after my mission told me our first kiss was one of the best she’d ever had. (And she assured me that she was no first timer.) I’ve had no complaints since.
The improvement certainly wasn’t due to any practice I’d had in the mission field–maybe there is something to all the promises of reward to those who serve…
Comment by Justin H — September 2, 2005 @ 11:29 pm
By the way–which is the changed name to “protect” the sloppy? Brence, or John?
Comment by Justin H — September 2, 2005 @ 11:31 pm
Oh, actually they are both false names. First I changed it to John and then I remember Ned Flanders telling me in a post once that the name Brence was considered manly and heroic. I decided to change it but I guess I missed one. Maybe I should have named him Eugene or something like that.
My husband has told me of the legend that the better a mission you serve the hotter your wife will be. I guess you must have served a good mission and that caused your mojo to get moving.
Comment by Kristen J — September 3, 2005 @ 8:50 am
This is my kissing history: I’ve been kissed by many guys, I was sort of a trollop when I was young. Kissing-wise.
But I had a slow start. Kristen, I know exactly what you’re talking about. I was thirteen and I thought it was the grossest thing I’d ever done and what was all the fuss about anyway and how crazy were my friends to want to do that? He wanted to do it again and again and I said no way. I broke his heart.
Then I met Norman, better. Norman, whoooooo. You know, think that song.
When I was 18, this really cute cowboy, really cute, tried to stick his tongue in my mouth, yuck. He wasn’t that cute.
So, two marriages later, I met a guy who could kiss. And another. And I married the love of my life, the Monk/Gregory Peck clone. think of the combination. Sigh. And that is my essay on kissing.
Comment by annegb — September 3, 2005 @ 9:45 am
I wonder if all boys’ first kisses are hot. :)
Comment by annegb — September 3, 2005 @ 9:48 am
I don’t even remember my first kiss. But I recently had a gross-out experience reading about your first kiss. For some reason, I went into this post supposing that Geoff wrote it. Imagine my dismay when I read, “I made it a really gross experience for me and the boy involved” (emphasis added). But, as annegb would say (quoting Seinfeld): not that there would have been anything wrong with that.
Comment by DKL — September 4, 2005 @ 6:04 pm
Now we’re all grossed out!
Comment by kristen j — September 5, 2005 @ 9:09 am
I don’t remember my first kiss. I do remember someone telling me I was a sloppy kisser. My wife doesn’t seem to mind. She likes to kiss me and love kissing her. We still kiss with the passion of teenagers just with exceptional skill and to think it only took 13 years of marriage.
Comment by Zane Thor — September 5, 2005 @ 9:49 am
Well my first kiss was when I was, let’s see, 20? And I had to pay the guy. VERY embarrassing. And, um, probably not the best idea, but being rather plain, shy, and depressed, I figured I’d never get another shot. And, to freak me out even more, it was, uh, very FRENCH. But I PAID somebody. Pathetic, huh? I can’t believe I did that, but I can safely state I wasn’t in my right mind cause I was bipolar but didn’t know it at the time. Hee Hee.
I wasn’t kissed for real until years later. By real, I meant by someone dating me cause they liked me. As opposed to the hoser my singles ward bishop set me up with (me and the bishop were good friends, so it’s not as wacko of an idea as it sounds). And we went on two dates, and at the end of the 2nd, I can see him considering. We had both (I thought) had a great time on the dates, considering I practically choked to death on the 2nd date and his ex-marine friend was about to start the Heimlich on me as I was passing out. Anyway, he was considering, then he darted in and forced himself on me, is about the only way I can put it, and I was in shock, and it was my first real kiss (cause the other thing didn’t count, really), and I froze, and he seemed to be very . . . voracious? Very . . .coldly just after what he could get before never seeing me again. I could feel all that in the kiss, and I felt rather . . .violated. And, he then left with nary a goodbye or anything, almost ran to his car and drove off.
Needless to say, the Bishop was very angry with him, he told me in a concerned, stern (about the hoser) voice that he was going to have “words” with him. The guy was an employee of his, so I suppose that could have been tricky, but anyway, it wasn’t good.
My first “real” kiss was with the man I married, the only one who ever dated me cause he liked me. And this was when I was 24.
Comment by sarebear — September 5, 2005 @ 2:21 pm
Wow Sarebear! Sounds like you went through some less-than-idyllic experiences before finally hitting lip pay dirt. Congratulations on the happy ending.
Zane and DKL — I can’t exactly remember my first kiss either. (But I do know I didn’t kiss a dude, DKL…)
Comment by Geoff J — September 5, 2005 @ 9:56 pm
I was 18 at the time of my first kiss, and I had a double-whammy – not only was it wet and sloppy, but I was so taken by suprise, that I ended up shoving him back across the car away from me.
I actually think it’s something to do with trumpet players… every one I’ve kissed has been rather sloppy.
Trombone players on the other hand… :)
Comment by Ginny — September 6, 2005 @ 7:36 am
This post has made me laugh out loud and my husband came to see what we were talking about. He just rolled his eyes. Now he won’t believe we talk about deep stuff.
Comment by annegb — September 6, 2005 @ 8:26 am
Yes I did, thanks Geoff! And boy did I, my husband is the best ever! Considering the idiot I paid was supposedly really good at it, my husband tops him by miles. Of course, I’m biased, but what my husband can do with just a kiss (on the lips! don’t take your mind there . . .), is unprintable here. Hee Hee. So I guess good things come in the end!
Comment by sarebear — September 6, 2005 @ 12:36 pm
I was always really good at getting a date, but never knew how to close, so embarrassingly I must admit that my first kiss came AFTER I had returned from my mission.
Here I am a return missionary dating a Baptist girl who is a freshman in college and in her Senior year at High School had cried for a mormon girl she knew because she knew that girl was going to hell for being a mormon…
And we’re on a date in the mountains of NC (okay hills of NC for y’all Utah people), sitting on a rock off the trail. And I ask her if I could give her a kiss. She says yes. And then I wait. And wait. Because I’m trying to get the nerve to actually do it. And then I lean in and kiss her and it turns out okay. Then she kisses me back, gets impatient with my so-so first kisses and the next thing I know my tonsils are being tickled.
I ended up marrying her (11 years this past Sept 2). And I tease her to this day, that I learned how to French before I learned how to kiss.
By the way, she joined the church about 3 years into our marriage.
Comment by Speaking Up — September 6, 2005 @ 1:08 pm
That’s a cool story, SU.
Ginny – What’s up with trombone players being less sloppy kissers that trumpet players? Seems counter-intuitive to me. I would expect trumpet players to be famous for dry sphincter kisses and trombone players (along with other deep brass players) to be prone to sloppy wet kisses…
Comment by Geoff J — September 6, 2005 @ 9:54 pm
You would think, wouldn’t you?
The trumpet players all seemed to go in for the “swallow your head” variety of kiss. Perhaps overcompensating for the percieved handicap? :)
Comment by Ginny — September 7, 2005 @ 2:11 pm