The Purple Sex Book was my parents? definitive answer to all things sexual, and had been ceremoniously presented to all three of my older siblings.
Flipping past cartoons of various barnyard animals mounting each other, my hands started to sweat as I approached what I hoped would be the definitive ?sexplanation.? Grand finale: a page at the end showing two humans lying next to each other with the bed sheets pulled up to their necks. Armed with that wealth of information, I entered my adolescent years fairly certain that I?d have to learn by experience.
A decade later, discovering ?hooking up? has been a highlight of my education.
It is important to note that to ?hook up? does not necessarily imply sex, but it does encompass that vast gray area between hand-holding and the actual deed.
It begins with kissing, and that one, pure delicious moment of a good kiss is worth hanging in there through a few sour ones.
The Reptile, the Face-Eater, and Dr. Dermabrasion have done some damage to kissing?s reputation. Still, I believe in the bliss of a kiss, especially the first one.
When you get past the introductory material, the coursework in hooking up is really quite rigorous. Concentration, technique and conditioning contribute to the final outcome, and adequate preparation is essential. This is where friends come in, and consulting them through the initial stages of hooking-up-ship helped me overcome a lot of novice?s nervousness. The Roxy is the most famous method to emerge from these sessions, but I?ll leave its secrets to your imagination and those who?ve experienced its wonders. As for conditioning, practice helps when one encounters those mood-killing roadblocks. While zippers, belts and the dreaded button-fly are all challenging, women are the greatest preservers of chastity for wearing bras.
Even with the proper levels of concentration, technique and conditioning, hooking up is inevitably embarrassing. Especially when guys try to bend you in ways that are most difficult to sustain, and when the nitty-gritty slaps you in the face.
Noises, sweat, fluid, flaws ? why do we subject ourselves to these things with perfect strangers? The random hook-up presents another problem ? stuff-retrieval. A certain black lace undergarment adorned a lampshade in Carmichael dorm for an entire year. In spite of everything, connecting physically with another person is inescapably alluring. My mom says this is because ?All guys want to do is get in your pants,? but I believe there?s still a little hope for romance.
