My first kiss was in the summer of 1972, just before I started high school.
Okay, I had been kissed a few times before then (John Gosnell in the 7th or 8th grade), but that’s not the one that I remember.
My mother and I were living with my grandmother again in her house on Bonifacio street. I had been skating for a while at Roller Haven in Walnut Creek and it was there that I met Kevin Wilson. Kevin was a keep it to himself kind of guy, roller-skating just because his mom wanted him to get some kind of exercise. He had bright red hair and freckles and worked as hard at ignoring me as I did trying to get him to notice me.
But notice me he did. Much to the dismay of all the other girls at the rink. He would skate with them but it was me he walked up to the Foster Freeze for snacks between practice sessions. It was me he would talk to on the phone for hours and hours.
I lived downtown in old Concord. Kevin lived in new town, closer to Walnut Creek. We weren’t old enough to drive and our parents weren’t too crazy about us being so crazy about each other.
Kevin was a future successful businessman. He had a paper route and he was dedicated to delivering on time. That also meant he had a bike, an old-fashioned single speed bike. And that he was used to riding it long and far. One summer day he called me and then hung up again almost as soon as I said hello. Later he said he wanted to make sure I was home but I remember worrying that he didn’t like me anymore.
About a half an hour later there was a knock on the front door. It was Kevin! I went outside and we stood together but apart under the orange trees in the driveway. I leaned back against a tree. Kevin leaned back against the car. We didn’t talk much, just stared at each other for a while and then Kevin stepped forward and quickly kissed me.
I was shocked, happy, and scared all at the same time.
As soon as it had begun, it was over. Kevin said he had to get home for his paper route. He hopped back on his bike and was gone. I drifted into the house in that hazy dreamlike state all-too-familiar to teenage girls and plopped down on my purple fur bedspread with a giant smile covering my face. I turned on the radio in time to hear the new song by Cornelius Brothers & Sister Rose, Too Late to Turn Back Now. Before the song had finished playing I had mapped out the rest of our lives together.
Your turn. What do you remember about your first kiss – or any memorable kiss?
Most memorable kiss:
I was… 25/26-ish. It’d been a really long, bad day. I’d been called in for extra hours to work, I’d had to drive to Cleveland for the doctor that morning. I was just dead.
My son, AJ, has Downs. He was still a bit unsteady walking, even though he was already three years old. I came home, ignored my husband — and his complaints — and collapsed in a chair. AJ crawled up into my lap to snuggle. Considering he was quiet I didn’t mind and just closed my eyes.
He made me open my eyes again, and puckered up and tapped his lips, just like I’d been doing to get a kiss from him and his twin sister for a while. And then, he gave me a kiss. His very FIRST ‘real’ kiss to me. Every other time, he never quite got the pucker part down.
To date? Still the best kiss ever.
Oh my goodness. You made me cry those wonderful kind of tears that make me glad to be alive. Thank you for sharing your very precious moment with me. Wow. Yes, BEST. KISS. EVER.
I actually used some of the details from my first kiss in my first manuscript. 🙂
I had just turned 15, and my boyfriend was two months away from his 15th birthday. We were both very shy, but we knew we wanted to kiss. We’d written countless notes back and forth on the subject discussing our scaredness.
Then, one day, we were both still at school after hours, trying to work up the nerve. As always. His mother called and asked the school secretary to send him home. He didn’t want to go, but even the principal got involved. It was dark and raining. I walked outside with him and said, “I promised myself that I would kiss you today. If I fail, I’m going to have to put toothpaste on my entire face as punishment. It’s going to sting. A lot.”
You see, I’d written in my journal the night before: Tomorrow — unless we are fighting or he is absent — I am going to definitely kiss him. I am. We will kiss. If I don’t kiss him on the lips, as punishment, I will have to smear toothpaste on my whole entire face and leave it on the whole night.
So he said, “Toothpaste, huh? Well, I don’t want you to have to go through that. We should probably just do it then.”
We stood there in the rain for about fifteen minutes, getting soaked and shivering while we stared at each other all embarrassed. Then there were headlights coming around the corner which we both recognized as belonging to his mom’s station wagon. We ducked into the bushes, and watched as she stomped up the school steps with curlers in her hair.
And that’s when he leaned in and kissed me. Then he said, “I love you” and got up and ran home.
Later that night, I wrote about our wacky adventure in my journal — including the aftermath of his mom yelling at me because she couldn’t find him. But it was all worth it because I’d finally gotten my kiss.
The last words of the entry were, I will never, ever, ever, ever forget this.
And I still haven’t. Of course, having the journal for reference helps a lot. 🙂
LOL – that’s a great story, thank you for sharing it. Now, of course, I’m compelled to test the theory if toothpaste would really sting if I left it on my face all night. 🙂
Ahh..the first kiss.
Ahh… the first kiss. Some of us can remember the first kiss or don’t want to choose to remember. Mine was on the latter. How romantic I wanted it to be! Watching all of those 80’s movies with C. Thomas Howell kissing his “Secret Admirer” who was his best friend (Lori Loughlin) in a harbor bobbing up and down in an embrace was I thought my first kiss was going to be like.
My first kiss… not so. I was fourteen years old in Junior High (’89) and had a “love interest” named Javier. All day rumors were weaving in and out of class that Javier was planning on kissing me. I had not seen him all day and knew nothing of this, but girls kept giving me googly eyes, making the stomach turn into knots. Knots turned into panic.
How was the whole “kissing” supposed to be? I had read every girly book to find out the details. Nothing specific enough. One book talked about the girl tilting the head back and the guy looking into her eyes for a long time before the kiss. I quickly looked at the copyright date…1938! I threw that book down.
Nervousness turned to fear and then after school came before I knew it. Fear turned to a surreal calmness. Can’t explain it. I waited by our school’s marquee while the rest of the school getting on the buses to go home in front of the school (by the marquee). Javier came and sat by me. He didn’t say a word. Girls walked by giggling and guys were giving Javier high and low fives. I noticed the crowd thinning out and almost everyone on the buses. Then the eyes on the buses were on us. Great, an audience! We sat there not talking, making small smiles on our faces trying not to laugh. The bus drivers were revving their engines. Did they know, too?
I turned to Javier to something like I have to go on the bus and he must have turned at the same time because I didn’t finish what I was saying. His face came close to mine and fast. His lips were moist. He must have licked them. I was thinking remember that next time, lick your lips. I thought now… how do you stop? One more rev of the antsy buses and we pulled away from each other. We ran to our buses without a word and I was greeted with light applause. I collapsed in my seat and thought Thank God it’s Friday!
Re: Ahh..the first kiss.
Oh dear on the choosing to not remember. :)Thanks for sharing the story!
NEVER BEEN KISSED!
But I write myself lots of little naughty stories about what it might be like!
…wait, was that too much information? 😉
Re: Ahh..the first kiss.
🙂
Ooh, good one, Susan. I’ve loved reading everyone’s stories! Mine was 7th grade, first junior high party, girls and boys, at Mike Honeywell’s house. Big house. We were all in the basement, dancing in couples, and David O’Dell (whom I had a huge crush on) and I kissed and slow danced and kissed and slow danced. All the other couples were doing the same. Mike’s mom would come down the stairs every so often to “deliver snacks” but really to make sure nothing too bad was going on. It was all very romantic, but then I don’t think he ever acknowledged it after that. It seems I must have been heart-broken, but I don’t remember, so maybe not!
My 6th grade boyfriend and I had kissed a couple of times–very sweet and innocent and nervous. But 7th-grade was my first hot kiss.
And now I’m looking at my going-into-8th-grade daughter, thinking, Uh-oh.
Oh it sounds like it was very romantic at the time. But yes, on M going into 8th grade. Yikes!