Tongue Hockey

My first kiss was from a knight. I was 10. We were on a date – with 500 others – at that famously romantic establishment: Medieval Times. The yellow knight and I locked eyes. I can still feel them penetrating my soul. Then, as if in slow motion, my knight reached down into his pouch, pulled out a yellow rose, kissed it, and threw it directly to me. I’m still surprised this knight is not my husband…

My second real kiss happened during spin-the-bottle. The boy I kissed had just eaten a popsicle. When our tongues connected, it sent goosebumps down my body – just like jumping into freezing water. Until my next kiss, I believed that all kisses were similarly chilling…

My first real kiss was with my boyfriend freshman year of high school. I think we both knew what was coming when we went downstairs to “hang” in the dark, 1960s knotty-pine-covered basement. We stood beneath a Big Mouth Billy Bass singing fish. The kiss lasted all of two seconds. There was no tongue. His lips were surprisingly squishy. The next day at school I found out he told his friends that the kiss was “good” but hadn’t lasted long enough. A few days later he dumped me…

During an especially anxious period of my life, I could not make out with anyone without contemplating the extraordinary number of germs being passed between us: 80 million to be exact.