This is an essay I wrote that won the Festival of Sandpoint/Angels Over Sandpoint Writing Scholarship.
The prompt was "What inspires you?"
I was thirteen years old and had never been kissed. Naturally, being a girl caught in the throes of the middle school spectrum, this was a catastrophic dilemma. Late at night I’d lie in my bed, feeling anxiety that I would forever be the girl who’d never been kissed. While my friends exchanged their fabulously fabricated first kiss fables, I’d create my fictional first kiss, complete with the sun rising over the moonlit hills, butterflies flapping their wings in approval at my inexperienced (yet flawless) kissing technique while the joyful songbirds serenaded to the stars still lingering over our heads. But, while a boy was a main character in my well-rehearsed daydream, his identity was hardly an issue I cared to imagine, a minor detail in the plot of losing my “lip virginity,” as sassy, sophisticated seventh grade girls referred to the process.
Most of my middle school years were filled with the fear I would be left behind as more of my friends began to tread into the adventurous and dangerous world of kissing boys. Desperate not to be left behind, I’d frantically search the hallways eagerly, looking for someone, anyone, with potential. When I caught the eye of a cute blond boy, shaking his long, wavy hair out of his tanned face, I knew this was my chance.
His name was Ryan and he had a goofy smile accented by his glowing white, if slightly imperfect, teeth. While his round, green eyes seemed blank and almost completely vacant when trying to hold a conversation, I couldn’t wait to get my first, most magical kiss from him.
It happened on a Tuesday, after school, our first date. Our conversation flowed shallowly smooth over milkshakes and fries, but I felt the frenzied butterflies of approval flapping and flying in my stomach the entire time. This is it, I thought as I nervously finished my sweetened strawberry shake. Finally, finally! I’d be able to brag about the magic of my first kiss. I already had the gushing text message I’d mass text to my friends choreographed in my head, including how Ryan would tuck my hair behind my ear and look me deep in the eyes before kissing me delightfully and perfectly in front of everyone. After all, that’s how it happens in the movies and my friends’ fabulous tales.
After our meal, he stood up first and I followed by grabbing his hand. While my heart fluttered endlessly, he leaned in and proceeded to give me the sloppiest kiss I’ve ever endured since. He tasted like salt and ketchup, his mouth exploring my nose instead of my mouth, leaving me wondering if I was still considered a lip virgin.
While kissing Ryan got increasingly better by a marginal amount during our short, month-long relationship that ended with a break-up letter via Myspace, the butterflies in my stomach had stopped and I couldn’t help but laugh at my needless, incentive worries that had haunted me in the past.
***
I was fourteen years old and had never been in love. This was, in part, due to my lack of boyfriends (only Ryan had so far made the exclusive list), and using hindsight, it seems I was only missing out on the false promises of forever and inconceivable ignorance of misplaced infatuation. At the time, however, I wanted nothing more than just that.
When I started dating Mike in the April following Ryan, he followed the basic junior high level template teenage boys use when trying to please their girls: ask her out on the phone, awkwardly hold hands and giggle at lunchtime, drop the “L” word after a week and a half, preferably on a Friday for a weekend recovery. And, truly, I didn’t think this was anything short of perfect.
He was different than anyone I’d normally be interested in, with fiery hair and a flaming temper, a temper that had him forcibly removed from the school grounds more than once. There was something in his eyes, though, a kindness, that in my eighth grade falsified sense of love, I believed they were the only eyes I wanted to see for the rest of my life. Eventually, as our relationship further developed from weeks to months to years, that warmth diminished, but we continued on, still clinging to the first feelings of romance, the promised prospect of true love.
In the year and a half we were together, on-and-off, but always crawling back to the comfortable cave we’d built for ourselves, I can only remember one perfect moment. That memory is protected by time and nostalgia, unsoiled by the pain and heartache later events would bring. The rest of our time was surrounded by lies and turmoil, secrets and a throbbing hurt that never quite seemed to disappear. When I finally decided to irrevocably end it, after one heart-wrenching sob, I felt better. Relieved, even. I had suddenly realized that love is more than whispered words following an acute apology. It was more than an empty promise. I knew there was more, but I didn’t know what.
***
I am eighteen years old and I am in love. I know this because there are no lies, no secrets, no angry Myspace messages. I know this because Graham inspires me; he makes me want to be a better person in every way. We don’t waste our energy with heated fights and false illusions; we ride bikes and rollerblade and take long walks, aimlessly talking about everything and nothing all at once. Our first dates occurred at the local soup kitchen, volunteering our time to better the community rather than selfishly focus on ourselves. I can feel myself improving my self-confidence and creativity, aspects in my life that suffered greatly during past relationships. The ways in which Graham inspires me is made up of a grocery list of items, whether it be from the endless ways he encourages me or the eminent perfection in the moments of the realization of true love.
My grocery list of inspiration doesn’t solely come from Graham, however. In their own, perhaps negative way, my experiences have led me to learn incredible lessons, leading to moments of inspiration and insight within themselves as well. Being with Ryan inspired me to hone my kissing techniques while my time with Mike proved to me that I had to surround myself with more positive influences. I don’t regret having these experiences in the least and it’s a considerable possibility that I’ll have plenty more inspirational relationships in the future. But, right now, I know that being with Graham is right for me.
Because when Graham kisses me, he gently tucks my hair behind my ear and looks me deep in the eyes, delightfully and perfectly in front of everyone, making every kiss like that inspirationally magical “First One” seventh grade girls love to imagine.