So procrastination is in full effect. I have only one exam. It’s tomorrow and here I am. but….
Last summer I was getting over what I thought was love. I was still emailing and calling the person in question, but he was living elsewhere forever and we’d parted in a strange way. When I get bolder I’ll go into this story. For now, let’s focus on the aftermath: this fall I went boy crazy until I had to say “Enough!” and impose a winter-celibacy on myself (not that it was actually stopping anything from happening…). I digress.
So, last summer I was walking home from summer school past all of the hotels that line our cross-street. Ahead of me I saw a gaggle of guys, skateboarders no less, practicing their moves. Taking them in, I realized that I recognized one of them from elementary school. It was a guy who had been friends with my little sister. He was part of a legendary family of boys; the middle one had been my first (and only!) boyfriend way back in Mr. Mundy’s class. We used to sit in the reading corner looking at car magazines and choosing which one we’d have when we got married. I always chose the red VW Golf. Such a practical child. I actually wonder about him a lot, and peruse his facebook every now and then. He’s single at the moment….
So I stopped a second in the middle of the guys and was like “Are you Skateboarder #1?” and he was like “Yeah.” I think he’s really well known now, and probably used to girls being all over him, so he just let it hang there. “I’m Zoe’s sister, Annik, from Crichton” “Oh man, hey!” and now I had a connection with the ring leader of these gorgeous skaters. They invited us to drink with them that night and I told them we were having a party on my roof, and that they should all come. Needless to say, I called my sister and got a bunch of girlfriends to come over and later that night the skateboarders streamed into my kitchen and onto my roof.
I was in heaven. There were tall ones, skinny ones, short ones, strong ones, there were ones with long hair and man-buns and ones with shaved heads. There were ones wearing plaid and ones wearing all black. Some were wearing tight jeans and others were rocking the early 90s baggy No Fear throwbacks. Something for everyone, and everyone was pretty much only me. Most of my girlfriends had boyfriends or hate grunge, so I just sat back and took them in! I guess i’m objectifying a bit here, and making it sound all evil, but really, everyone knows skaters who are in town for one weekend are not up for anything serious. And neither was I.
I managed to bring some of the girls to the punk show the skaters were heading to, and we entered a deeper level of heaven. Even more guys, Even fewer girls. Maybe you don’t understand my excitement. I go to a school that is made up of 60% women and 40% men. Then imagine that most of those guys are in Engineering. The remainder in my faculty, Arts, are then either taken or gay. Makes for real slim pickings. By this point I had scoped out my ideal skater. Skater #2 had a glass eye, he was tall and skinnystrong, he rocked out hard to Slayer (not my music but I like a guy who dances) and he had noticed me.
Long story short, Skater #2 and a few other guys ended up at my house early that morning. Three of the skaters slept in my living room on our giant beanbag, the Zepplin Love Craft (you’ll hear more about this later), and Skater #2 ended up in my bed. This was a really PG night, and it was awesome. Our clothes stayed on, we chatted, we got a little human contact and we fell to sleep.
I was pretty into Skater #2, but the next night he was sleeping early so that he would be on form for the finals. So I went out again with the group, this time bringing my sister along. She had a great time rekindling old friendships. Elementary school is such a great time in some ways. They were friends from the bus stop, and would run around together at recess, so that carefree sense of being between Skater #1, my sister and Skater #1’s best friends from Crichton, Skaters #3 and #4, just carried through. They had such a pleasure catching up, holding hands…
Meanwhile, I was being wooed by a particularly romantic skater who also came from my hometown. He bought me a drink, bought me a rose and walked with his arm around my waist. Skater #5 was the first guy to buy me a flower, and even though I wasn’t really into him, I let myself enjoy being treated well. Somehow, we walked to the bathroom and started to makeout outside them, then through a weird mind meld, we separated and went to our separate toilets. Emerging, we dove back into it. Skater #5 was a good kisser, really energetic and passionate and into tongue and I was having fun. We walked outside and did the drunken makeout against a storefront thing. It was raining by now and Skater #5 had hurt his ankle at the competition, so he couldn’t walk. He kept saying he’d pay for a taxi to take us to my house, and that he visited Montreal often (as if I wanted him to be my boyfriend, or to have the illusion of him as my boyfriend in order to take him home). I rejected the idea and told him to go back to his hotel, and that I would go home alone. Finally, he got into a cab and I walked home satisfied with my weekend.
I had had some really nice human contact, something that happens far too rarely for me, and I had done it without compromising the principles I was trying to work out for how to survive as a romantic in a hook-up world.
Lessons Learned:
Staying Lighthearted, Hoping for a Pass, it’s Annik.
