Guest Blog: It started off, "Hey, cutie, where you from?"

Well, hey, y’all—long time, no see. I do hope you’re enjoying the slight reprieve from the Great Heat Wave of 2011 down here in the south, and are gearing up for the season of football games (i.e. tailgating), Brach’s Candy Corn, hot chocolate, and stuffin’. As a special fall treat, my friend, Katie, has written her first guest blog for your reading pleasure. Look for more guest blogs to come (I’ve been collecting), as well as a few posts from yours truly in the near future. Follow me on Twitter to make sure you know when I’ve updated! And now, on to H2LG1D’s latest cautionary tale…

This, friends, is a tale of a naïve girl’s first date and first kiss. Prepare yourselves to shake your heads in pity, gasp in horror, and laugh at the ridiculous nature of this date. And please bear with fifteen-year-old Katie. She was young, inexperienced, and flattered by this older gentleman caller. And don’t worry, I used to be embarrassed that my first date and first kiss weren’t until I was fifteen, but I’m totes over it. In fact, for the sake of the story, I think it only adds to the terror. Do not pity though, twenty-two-year-old Katie has learned her lesson and is quite the classy lady.  Shall we begin?

Sidebar (E): I didn’t get my first real (i.e. non-stage) kiss until I was almost eighteen. And it was AWFUL. Reason #76 why peer pressure/power of suggestion inevitably bite you in the ass.

Back circa summer 2005, I was on a summer league swim team. As summer leaguers we spent our Saturday mornings sitting on a pallet of towels with our friends, playing cards, drawing on each other with markers, and trying to qualify for the coveted Ponderosa meet at the end of the season. The beauty of swimming is that it is a co-ed sport. Flirting whilst practicing and competing was a norm. Plus, there were gentlemen in Speedos everywhere. Now, after ten years of swimming, I was over the Speedo. It really had no effect of me. To focus on practice, you had to get over it. In fact, the boys thought they were way more attractive in them than I and my fellow seasoned swimming ladies actually did. They would walk around with their butt cracks hanging out, flexing their 4 to 6 (give or take) pack of abs. We were over it. And I’ve digressed.

Summer 2005. One particular Saturday meet, one of the 18 and under fellows in particular was focusing more of his attention on me than before. I think prior to this meet we had said “Hi” maybe once?  He had just graduated high school, making him two entire years older than yours truly.  Lemme just say…THIS WAS A BIG DEAL! And a big mistake. We shall name this fellow ­­Kolka.

Fun fact: Kolka is actually his middle name. His mother is straight from Iceland.

Sidebar to Fun Fact (E): I totally read his name as “Koala” at first, which puzzled me exceedingly.

Kolka was two years older, attractive, and a smooth operator. Not that it would have taken much to convince me to go on a date at this point in my teenaged life, but with those three qualities at work, I was smitten. After flirting all Saturday morning, I left the meet with my mom, and he ran up and requested my digits.

Fun fact: I had just gotten my very own cell phone a month prior. I was a big girl now.

I probably peed my pants a bit and went through every possibility of why he would need my number with my mother on the way home.  Why would cute and older Kolka want my number? It was mind-boggling.

When I got home, I got a text from him saying, “Wanna go out tonight?” (We’ll count how many times I say I should have known then in this story) I have a TERRIBLE memory, so I’m not exactly sure what went down next, but it probably involved getting really excited, dancing and doing high kicks in my room, then getting really nervous about asking my Dad if I could go. I went downstairs to ask Faja and it went something like this…

Sidebar (E): Oh, I so wish there was video of the high-kicks! Re-enactment?

15-year-old Katie: “Hey, Daddy, so, um, Kolka wants to go out with me tonight. Can I?”

Daddio: “Kolka who?”

15-year-old Katie: “………..?”

I DID NOT KNOW HIS LAST NAME! In fact, this got me thinking, I did not know anything about Kolka except that he was totally fine and was two years older and wanted to take me out. What more did my father want?! A last name? Stupid.

Sidebar (E): I think we all know where this was going…

Fun fact: The reason I didn’t know Kolka’s last name was because it was fourteen letters long and completely Icelandic, so it wasn’t pronounced anything like it was spelled. Minor details.

15-year-old Katie: “Well I don’t really know, but I’ll find out…tonight, at the movies.”

I could tell I had thrown my father for a loop. As the eldest child, I was the first to request such a thing. So after a short hesitation, and realizing that I was fifteen and most of my friends had been in and out of three or four “relationships” by now, he agreed to my night out.

Sidebar (Katie): Woooow! As I typed that last sentence that I remembered that I was, in fact, sixteen years old, not fifteen! Please note: I. Was. Sixteen. I don’t want to go back and change the fifteen times I said I was fifteen.

Sidebar (E): ‘Cause when you’re…erm…SIXteen! And somebody tells you they love you, you’re gonna believe them… Sorry, but this post is really making me want to go download some pop-country J

So, Kolka came to my house to pick me up in his super cool black truck. He came to the door to meet my father in a bright green hat that said CORONA in bright yellow across the front. I should have known then.

From here on out the details of the date get a little foggy. I believe this is due to two things:

1. I always have had and always will have a terrible memory
2. My brain’s primary defense mechanism is repression

We got to the movies and realized that our first movie choice was sold out. Who cares what it was. All that matters is that we decided to see Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith instead. I was less than thrilled. I should have known then. I do love Star Wars, but I had built this whole first date situation up in my head and Star Wars was cramping its feng shui. On top of that, we walked into the COMPLETELY full theater and had to find seats on the second row. Here, my friends, is the scene where one of the most awkward moments of my life occurred.

Recap: 2^nd row.

Huge screen.

Craning necks.

Anakin Skywalker turning to the Dark Side

About twenty minutes into the movie, Kolka reached over and took my hand. This was a lovely and first date-appropriate gesture. However, the next move was not.

He dropped my hand

and

reached

for

my

…

face.

When his hand reached my face he started slowly caressing.

Repeat… caressing.

Sidebar (E): Okay, seriously? Is there some sort of Halfwit Academy for Wannabe Ladies’ Men out there that teaches a class on awkward face-caressing/wrist-stroking? Who is telling them that this is okay?!

Up until this point, I had not thought about Kolka wanting to kiss me. We didn’t even know each other’s last names. Surely that is a perquisite to lip locking?!

Sidebar (E): Thank you, Carrie Underwood, for instructing us in this matter. Silly little 16-year-old Katie! You could have married him without knowing his last name!

I. Freak. Out.

 I did not know what he was doing. My instinct was to just keep looking at the movie screen. I thought, “Maybe if I look super interested in the movie, he’ll stop.”

He did not.

He kept awkwardly caressing my cheek…my ear… my chin… and even my lips…with one hand. I should have known then.

Sidebar (Katie): Who caresses people’s lips?! (ever….but mostly on a first date!?)

I was in full-out, body-paralyzing panic. I cannot tell you how long this went on, but it was long enough to watch Anakin (a.k.a. Darth Vader) and Obi-Wan Kenobi engage in a lightsaber duel where Vader’s leg and arm are cut off. Long enough. Kolka soon realized his seduction techniques were not working on this scared, naïve, slightly trembling from fear, little girl.

So he got forceful and straight to the point. I should have known then.

He took my entire face and turned it towards his and before I even knew what was happening he was kissing me. Let me just say that his was not a soft, sweet kiss that all girls imagine their first kiss to be. It was sloppy, moist, and aggressive. His tongue was involved. Way too involved. I should have known then. I was mortified. He finally let me out of his sloppy, moist grasp and I just sat back and stared at the movie screen trying to comprehend what the devil just happened.

Sidebar (E): Apparently at the HAWLM, there is also a class called “Their Mouths, Your Tongues,” in which they all practice violent tongue-thrusting for use on unsuspecting victims.

If I had had the confidence of twenty-two-year-old Katie, I would have said something dramatic and left the date promptly. But, alas, this was a far less-cool version of me. I was still “star struck” that I was on a date with this guy and I sat out the rest of the movie trying to convince myself that maybe that was what kissing was, and that I was totally cool with it.

After the movie, we walked out hand-in-hand to the ice cream shop across the street. I had “recovered” to a point and was able to carry on normal teenaged conversation for about a half an hour before he took me home. 

When we pulled up to my house, I was ready with an escape route planned. I thanked him quickly, keeping out of face-caressing reach, and literally jumped out of the truck. In my room, I sat and mulled over the date and decided that the kiss was far too intense for me and I wouldn’t be going out with him again.

Sidebar (E): Famous last words.

I’ll spare you the gory details because the above date can be passed as funny but the rest of the tale of Kolka’s and my relationship unfortunately cannot.

My “don’t go out with him again” plan failed and we ended up dating for a year and a half.  What can I say? I was passive. 

He went on to cheat on me multiple times with multiple girls. There’s just no way I can make that funny.

I could go on and on about how stupid I was and how I should have known (clearly, there were signs), but I won’t. Instead I will just say this: Ladies, just because he’s older doesn’t mean he’s cooler, and trust your gut. There are some certified douche bags out there. Happy dating to you all!

“I should have known” Count: 7

Many thanks to Katie for sharing her story. I’m sure that all of us have had our fair share of “I should have known’s” but it’s always nice to hear each other’s horror stories to remind ourselves that we are not alone in the fight against the KKDB’s of the world (that’s Kappa Kappa Douche Bag to all you uninitiated).