The Great Expedition

Not sure how the girls went about it all, but at least for the guys, finding out about sex, the one thing that brought us into our very own existence, seemed like trying to uncover some giant government conspiracy.  We did all our research behind closed doors, like Noir detectives tying the clues together to try and figure out what the hell was going on.  Kids would keep watch and then come to huddle around some catalogue or random advertisement you'd found scrounging through the classifieds, or maybe even a page ripped violently from a Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, and you'd all just bark incoherently as electric pulses shot across the synapses in your brains.  Well something like that.

But it really wasn't until you finally got that full frontal visual, a blunt, fleshy 2x4 of sex to the face.  And at whatever stage in your pubescent rage, it was like stumbling upon fucking crack, and instantly you learn the meaning of having a drive that puts any feelings you had about wanting ice cream, chocolate, or to become a ninja to shame.

Discovering porn was basically the introduction to the siren's song; to feasting your eyes on what Indiana and Marion closed theirs to in order to keep from melting like gluttonous, boiling Nazis.  So good and so bad.  And then combine the timing with this discovery with the advent of the goddamn World Wide Web; that's just plain overkill.   Hey kids!  Have ya heard about sex?  Did you know there's this free and unrestricted portal to as much and more than you could ever possibly take into your fricken head?  Well here ya go!  Call me when you've got enough viruses to shut down the town's dial up connection.

Then finally whenever the adults try to "introduce" kids to sex, no matter how open and cool adults try or want to be in talking to their kids about it, they inevitably end up hopelessly awkward and anything but cool.  It says a lot about what it means to have a sex organ and a brain at the same time.  Sex ain't shit for animals; you want a piece?  You fight, you dance, you sing, you give everything that your genetics and carbon gave you in an effort to get some.  Humans also fight, dance, and sing for some sort of sexual goal, but they do it all just beneath the facade of being a civilized, manicured Person instead of an animal.  That's where the brain starts to get in the way, and the games, the meanings behind actions and words and body language all get tangled up in some convoluted mess of shit.  This is the part where puberty turns nightmarish; the fact that looking at sex does not translate into real life sex is a sobering realization for a teenage boy.  Instead, sex becomes a weapon, a curse, a weight, and through it all the tortured final goal of adolescence.

I remember how much I hated it when American Pie came out (1999 - what was that, 7th grade?) because all of the sudden there was this streamlined, Hollywood testament that you have to lose your virginity by the end of high school.  I was always behind in knowing the terms for various forms of sex and was probably guiltier than the next about jacking off, plus I was shy, I mumbled, had braces, had crazy acne, and my voice sounded like I caught a football in the neck; basically, I felt utterly inadequate about my sexuality, and fucking Jason Biggs, the suddenly grown-up kid from Rookie of the Year, Stifler, and some slicked-back-hair ass were all taunting me via Josh's big screen tv (where we watched all films containing  any degree of nudity) that I was going to die of humiliation because I wasn't even close to being on track for their great, horn-dog goal.

Luckily, I smartened up at least a little bit during high school to stop hating myself so much.  But shyness being what it was, I continued to fear that even though I knew how to smile and flirt, at least a little, I didn't know jack about making a move.  And that was what it was all about it, or at least it seemed that way.  I think that's where this ingrained holy grail of confidence comes from, the fact that guys have to be confident enough to make that move.  But for some time, I stayed dismally attached to the fear that if I made a move she'd pull away and the great misfortune of rejection would rain down on me until I drowned, or something melodramatic like that.  I did manage small successes and romanticized each one with all my imagination, even though I knew shit like Kingsbridge was going down all around me, and I generally just tried not to think about it.  I didn't even talk to that many of my friends about sex, or at least when I did, I generally held back or was scared to reveal my true ignorance on the one subject that mattered as a teenager.

Eventually I was out of high school and still a virgin, although not with the some extreme shame I'd imagined back in '99.  There was just plenty of frustration and angst and disappointment in that aspect of my life to leave behind, so I was happy to get on with it all.  In college I proceeded to basically befriend and become the boyfriend of the first girl I liked.  I thought it was somehow (and it sickens me to say it) noble or something that amidst all the banging and drugs and sleaze put on display those first few months at college that I was going for the hard stuff.  A full on relationship!  The hell was I thinking?  Anywho, she had had sex before so the pressure was on me.  We did it not all that long after we'd gotten together, and it was rather anti-climatic; though I'm not sure what I was expecting (maybe to run out into the dorm hallway and give Biggs and Stifler high fives?  Those bastards). Again, the brain and the penis aren't exactly well-acquainted.  The one thing I do remember was that when I left her dorm for breakfast, I gave the old Asian lady, Fu, who swiped my meal card a devious smile to let her be the first to know that I got lucky for the first time in my life.  She didn't seem all that impressed.