It is officially one week away from graduation, and I have become increasingly nostalgic and wistful, and have experienced a strange, intense longing to go back and re-experience some of my childhood. In light of these bizarre, inexplicable feelings, I have decided to recount my first kiss. In great, unsolicited detail.
The year: 2003. The place: Camp Timber Tops, the Mountain Camp for Girls. (It’s true: In classic, Jewish-East Coast-girl fashion, I had my first kiss at summer camp.) All the girls in my age group, plus the boys from our brother camp, piled onto a Coach bus to go to Boston. All the cool kids immediately fled to the back of the bus. Ipso facto, I sat squarely in the middle of the bus with my body permanently turned towards the back, desperately trying to insert myself into the conversation.
Suddenly, someone decided we should play “Seven Minutes in Heaven.” When one of the smarter kids reminded us that we were on a bus and thus there was no private place to go except the grimy bathroom, the game was changed to “Truth or Dare.” Jason Rosenberg started the game and promptly turned to me to ask, “Lindsey, truth or dare?” Like a complete idiot-loser I giggled and said through the spit gathering in my retainers: “Truth!!!” Suddenly, everyone’s faces fell. It became clear that I had made the wrong choice, and Jason abruptly turned to my friend Zoe and asked her the same question.
She chose “Dare,” clearly giving the answer all of our pervy 14-year-old minds were looking for. “I dare you to make out with Stevie Weiss!” Jason sputtered. Like a true champ, Zoe sat next to Stevie and went for it. I was both stunned and inspired. “OK DARE!!!” I shouted at nobody in particular.
Jason considered my overeager offer and turned to me once more. “Fine, I dare you to make out with Matt Goldberg.” “Fine,” I said, waaaay more confident than I felt. I plopped down ungracefully next to Matt and took a deep, audible breath. In a very socially unacceptable move, I then proceeded to roll my shoulders back and shake my head from side to side, as if I was preparing to run a 5K. I then lunged forward and started with my kiss, which could more accurately be described as a sort of face-eating action. The entire thing lasted maybe five seconds, during which I opened my eyes and could see several eyes peering back at me. I pulled away and stared at Matt for a few seconds. I then got up, wiped the slobber off my chin, and returned to my seat.
It took me years to make sense of this kiss. Is THIS what making out was supposed to be like?! Surely not every future makeout I have will culminate with a chin wiping…and in fact, many years later, I understood that was decidedly NOT what making out was supposed to be like. It just took me one awkward kiss with Matt Goldberg to realize it.
* All most names have been changed.