A Sleepy Girl's Thoughts on Life

My cringe-worthy past

I first started dating during my last year or so of high school (yes, I was a late bloomer in that sense). At first, I was completely scared and clueless. However, I somehow gained enough confidence--or maybe it was naivete--to make some bold moves on guys.

As I think back on it now, these moves weren't so much bold as completely ridiculous. I was so NOT smooth. In fact, I bordered on needy and desperate. Here are just a few examples that I still cringe just thinking about:

1) The video store hook-up
There was this guy who really liked one of my friends. He started talking to me just to get to her, and when she refused him he decided he liked me. At first I was appalled, but then my natural insecurity set in and I began to enjoy the attention. Plus, I'd had only one boyfriend at that point and was ready for more "experience."

The guy--who was more of a "bad boy" and not my type at all--worked at a video store near our high school. I started to visit him there, and we first kissed at my car after one of my store visits. That day as I drove away, I immediately start worrying about how the kiss was. I hadn't had much kissing experience, and I didn't want him to think I was a bad kisser.

So I did exactly what I shouldn't have done: I called him not even 10 minutes after the kiss took place, and proceeded to tell him that a) I was happy we kissed, and b) I hadn't kissed anyone in a while so I may have been out of practice. Seriously, I did this. It was quite possibly the most pathetic action I could have taken in that situation. Talk about sending the wrong messages.

Of course this whole "relationship"--which only took place in the video store and included no actual dates at all--went nowhere. I eventually decided I didn't want to date him because he was settling for me when he really liked my friend. But seriously, I'm not sure he would have wanted a girl who engaged in cheap, tame video store hook-ups and then assualted him with her neediness anyway. Oh, and after I "rejected" him, we "hated" each other for a little while. High school. Ugh.

2) The car kiss
For some reason, I began liking one of my neighbors. He'd lived there forever, but one day my good friend and I decided he was super hot. We started talking to him and hanging out with him every so often. Eventually, though, he and I would just talk on the phone without actually seeing one another. So I'd do really dumb stuff like pretend to get the mail when I knew he'd be driving past on his way home. I was such a stalker (and still am, for the record--watch out).

So one day he told me about the great new Pontiac his parents bought. I wanted to see it, and he told me he'd be on his way out (or was it in?) so I could go outside and meet him in front of my house. I went, of course, and waited on the stoop until he drove up. I ran across the lawn to the car, and hopped in. We sat there awkwardly talking, when all of a sudden I get this burst of insane cockiness.

Right there in his car pulled over on the side of the road in front of my house (with my parents inside and able to look out at any moment), I ask him straight out if I can kiss him.

"Can I kiss you?" I say.

"It's up to you," he says.

"No, a kiss takes two people," I cockily reply.

I guess he said yes or something, because we did kiss. I thought I was real smooth. Oh, and it gets better... I think I may have told him his lips were soft afterward.

Can you guess what happened after that? I hopped out of the car, he went on his way to wherever he was going, and we never hung out again. I was a total loser. The end.

3) The e-mail emergency
I had plenty of crushes in high school, but there was one that I felt I should act on. I didn't act on it in a normal way, of course, by flirting and trying to get to know the guy. No, I e-mailed him. Anonymously.

I sent out a secret admirer-type e-mail explaining that I liked him and giving little hints. He seemed very intrigued (and was probably a little scared), but he kept e-mailing me back and asking questions. It went on for maybe a week or so until I finally tripped up. I accidentally sent him an e-mail from my non-anonymous account...the one with my full name in the "from" field.

I really wish I still had that horrible e-mail trail, but I erased it in utter humiliation, so I'll recount from memory here. He wrote something like, "Oh, I didn't know it was you." I responded by saying how sorry I was and how ridiculous I felt. He assured me that I had nothing to worry about, but he never came out and said he liked me back. We started talking in class for a little while afterward, but nothing else ever came of it.

Even if he had liked me before, my crazy stalking definitely scared him off. I'm sure he told a bunch of his friends about it too. It's a wonder that I actually ever landed a boyfriend in high school.

So, the point of all this is...I would never do any of this stuff now. I wouldn't do it because I've learned to value myself more and to have some class when it comes to guys. I guess in a way I've learned to play the "game"--to refrain from putting my vulnerability out there.

But in another way, I haven't learned anything at all. Back then, I at least had some guts. I could tell a guy I liked him, and I could ask a guy for a kiss. I could do things that I am now absolutely terrified of doing. Maybe it's because I'm older and wiser, or maybe it's because I'm so jaded, but I'm afraid to put myself on the line like that now.

I may have been a naive and sometimes desperate 18-year-old, but at least I wasn't afraid of rejection.

So, girls, anyone got any stories as cringe-worthy as these? Please assure me that I wasn't the only loser on the planet in high school.

posted by Sleepy Girl @ 11:04 AM