Feb
Hello
It’s Sunday morning and as Haven mentioned, this is my first blog. Ever. I debated mentioning this, wondered if it would strike fear in the hearts of those reading, but then it’s not as if I’m piloting a plane and saying, “Hi, I’ll be your captain today and I’m so thrilled you’re all joining me on my first flight ever.” Knowing me I’d probably still have the microphone on when I turned to my co-pilot and said, “Bob what does this button do again?”
A little bit about me. I’m 36. I live in Manhattan. I’m single. My first novel, “She’ll Take It” was published last March by Kensington Books and my second, “Accidentally Engaged” will be released in a few days. They are both quirky romantic comedies although the first one could be said to have a bit of a dark side, it is about a kleptomaniac loose in the big city, struggling with well– everything.
Accidentally Engaged is much lighter, more of a romantic adventure– my UK publisher classified it as a quirky romantic road trip you’ll likely never forget– so let’s go with that. It is about a thrice-divorced tarot card reader, Clair, who has a total blind spot when it comes to predicting her own love life. She gets roped into doing a reading for a bride-to-be with cold feet and things really get started when the bride-to-be flees from her tent leaving behind her three-carat diamond ring to be returned to the groom-to-be vodka-magnate Jack Heron. It’s a lot of fun from there with tons of quirky characters, romanctic possibilities and mysteries galore.
And so last night when I was wondering what I would talk about in my first “flight”, I decided I’d like to talk about kissing. Please don’t think I’m shallow, I can talk about anything you’d like, and I’ll get to that at the end of my blog, but yes, today I think kissing is the topic. In Accidentally Engaged, my heroine has very specific reactions to kisses she receives from two totally different men– and funny enough I had the issue come up recently on a date. Nice enough guy. Attractive. No huge deal breakers– until– he kissed me. Now I don’t expect fireworks or earthquakes (although it would be nice), but it was awful. Really, really awful. I wondered at first if it were a joke– I looked around for a hidden camera. Kind of like kissing a fish. And then I realized this was it, the shoe had definitely dropped, and it seemed to be wedged in his mouth. And I tried a few minutes of justifying “I can get over this”, “I can teach him”, “Let’s try this again”, “Maybe I’ll just be really drunk every time we kiss”– all of this running through my head– until I realized I just couldn’t do it. Game Over.
Would it be a deal breaker for you? I have to be honest, it’s a deal breaker for me. I love kissing. I can’t imagine being with someone you didn’t want to kiss. So it got me thinking last night about all the men I’ve kissed– it’s like that Sex in the City episode where they say– okay if you get to be a certain age and you’re still single, the numers are starting to rack up– so suffice it to say I’ve done a lot of kissing. I even wrote a one act play several years ago called Kissing Frogs. Are we conditioned as girls to worship kissing? Did Prince Charming totally screw us up?
So I’d like to hear from you. Your first kiss? Your best kiss? Your worst? How important is kissing to you?
My first kiss was in the Bahamas, I was thirteen– he was seventeen– Jeff Westmoreland– if any of you happen to know him, tell him I say hello. Also tell him I’m sorry I laughed when he kissed me, I was just really nervous. And I was wearing one of those wrap-around island dresses that tie in all sorts of funny places so I think there was a lack of circulation going on– anyway you probably don’t remember me, but you were my first kiss and you were gorgeous so I still think of you fondly.
Some of the best kissers I’ve had though didn’t make great boyfriends, so that’s another thing. How can a kiss be so amazing and yet still the relationship crashes and burns? Is it just chemistry, just a little lip-locking luck that makes you a good kisser? And what I really find horrifying, did the recent awful-kisser think I was an awful kisser too? Does it take two to make a good kiss or is one enough?
I miss the last guy I dated, we just fit. I could have kissed him forever. But even with our amazing kissing-connection, he still took off. So I wonder, does he have that experience with everyone he kisses? Because I certainly don’t. Some other kisses that stand out– kissing in the rain up against a buildng in the East Village was amazing. I still smile when I walk by that section of town. It was a summer rain, it was two o’clock in the morning, the attraction had been growing with this guy but I liked his friend (drama, drama, drama) but when we finally kissed it was electric and the rain, and the groping pasison, and the brick wall, and all that, drama! Exciting. But fleeting sometimes. I love being kissed outside pushed up against a building, is it just me? And there have been others too whose kiss almost transports you to another place. No wonder so many song lyrics talk about kissing– “It’s in his kiss”, “Your kiss is on my list”, etc.
Off course there’s also the opposite– “Kiss off”– “Kiss my…….” You get it.
My worst kiss? A long, long time ago. Let me preface it by saying that at the time I hated mushrooms on pizza. I was set up on this date by a friend. He picked me up at my place and instead of taking me out somehow we ended up ordering a pizza. In the elevator after fetching his pizza, he took a huge bite of mushroom stuff and then without warning lunged for me and kissed me. I think I got a mushroom in my mouth. It was the grossest thing ever. He worked for the sanitation department too, which is neither here nor there, but I just remembered that.
Okay so that’s my first, some of my best, and my worst. Your turn! Can’t wait to hear your stories.
That’s it for now. Happy Academy Award watching. I will be giving away some fun prizes this week, signed copies of both books and a deck of tarot cards, but I can talk about that more tomorrow. I can’t wait to hear your kissing stories. Hmm, Haven– how about a prize for the worst kissing story? I’ll send the winner hersheys kisses and lip gloss.
Whew, I think the plane is still in the air, although a few of you may have reached for your barf bags when the garbage man gave me the mushroom kiss– sorry about that– it was my first time after all, so you shouldn’t be surprised by a little turbulence. And I have to warn you, be careful the next time you pucker up, perspectives on kissing may have shifted during flight.
Excellent first blog ever, Mary. So good I’m coming out of lurkdom to answer.
A little OT - I have been on a plane, a puddle jumper to a nearby big city where the pilot seriously looked like he was fifteen. I’ll bet he knew this and got a kick out of people suddenly looking like they were going to flee.
As to worst kiss ever, I’m not going to win the prize. In fact, I think that you will win your own prize on this one. Ew. I don’t think I ever exchanged lunch with anyone. Gum, maybe, but not lunch.
But the reason I’m mentioning mine is so everyone else will feel more comfortable because I was the giver, not the receiver. It was my first kiss ever and I opened my mouth too wide. Way too wide. Knowing what I know now about kissing, it must have been truly terrible. It was at summer camp and he really liked me before that and totally ignored me after. It was, apparently, a deal breaker for Ross. I am still absolutely mortified thirty six years later.
My best ever - is it horrible to admit it’s not the DH? After a high school dance, I got kissed by someone who absolutely knew what he was doing. Mmmm. Still memorable thirty three years later. Trouble was, he was a man ho and I knew it, so that’s where the relationship ended. But for those few moments, I didn’t really care. Yup, transported to another place.
Thanks for the interesting blog, Mary.
February 25th, 2007 at 11:30 amWhat a fun blog, Mary. If this is your first time, then you must just be a natural. My best kiss came from the man who I ended up marrying. I was working a college summer job at a big commercial bakery in Philadelphia and he was the laboratory manager (not MY boss, I hasten to mention). This was 38 years ago and well before the days of “sexual harassment” being so loosely defined. Anyway, he kept whispering to me that he was going to kiss me silly, and I finally told him he was “all talk and no action” and then I made a dramatic exit into the big walk in incubator. Well, I guess he was a man that couldn’t resist a challenge and he followed me right in and kissed me silly. We’ve been married for 35 years this July and he can still kiss me silly. Bad kissing would have definitely been a deal breaker.
February 25th, 2007 at 12:28 pmWelcome, Mary, very nice blog, I’m you’re spending the week blogging with us!
February 25th, 2007 at 12:54 pmI tried to ignore the bad kissing deal with my ex, who I was engaged to for a spell. Kisses from him where like kissing a very slobbery-mouthed dog. You’d need a wet cloth to clean up all the drool. It was truly gross. However, I did stay with him for awhile, hoping and praying things would improve. I even told him that he needed to learn how to kiss. Which he would do wonderful for a month or two and then back to wet dog. So end the end, no matter how nice he was or how much he fancied me…he had to go.
Now for my best kiss, that would be the husband, and I’m not saying this because he’s my husband either lol. He takes his time and you truly melt into his chest with those kisses. When he’s feeling playful, he’ll even give a little nibble on the lower lip, which again, I melt.
I completely agree, if you can’t picture yourself kissing this guy forever, you might want to exit stage left before your stuck with it. I think finding the perfect guy, you have to find the perfect balance that fits you. For some it’s a perfect kisser, for others its someone who can see eye to eye with them. I’d rather have small fights with a guy and have tons of fun kissing and making up, than have a guy just be a good chat-buddy.
February 25th, 2007 at 1:35 pmGreat first blog! And we could be long lost twins (I’m 36, single, in San Francisco, and being published by Kensington, LOL!). I’m also 100% in agreement with you about the kissing thing. I’ve only once had a HAWT makeout session that lead to truly awful (bland) sex. It might even be my best kiss ever story. *grin* We were making out in his car (note, we were both over 30), he grabs me and pulls me into his lap (note, I’m 5′10″ and he’s 6′8″ so this is no easy maneuver), and the whole side seam of my vintage 1950s dress just gives . . . there’s a pregnant pause and he whispers, “I’ll buy you a new one.” and goes back to kissing me. So freaken HAWT. God I wish he could have been that guy all the time. *sigh*
February 25th, 2007 at 2:34 pmI totally cracked up reading this! Your voice is terrific.
Bad kisses? Hm. The best story that comes to mind isn’t fit for the internet. Or rather, it’s perfect internet material–like 6 o’clock news material (”Tonight on KOMO: what your teenage daughter is getting into!”)–but I simply can’t bring myself to share it. And trust me, that’s hard. Because it’s *almost* as good as the mushroom story and I do love Hershey’s kisses. Especially those new ones with the cherry filling. Yum!
Good kisses? What about Good Kisses that End Badly? As in…I kissed someone else’s boyfriend. Ok, to be perfectly honest HE kissed ME but God, did I want it. And it was absolutely the best kiss ever and he was probably the best boyfriend I ever had if you don’t count the fact that he cheated on his last girlfriend to come and kiss me for a month or two. (Did someone mention man hos?) In the end I sent him back to his ex-girlfriend. I even gave him some helpful hints on what to say. Not sure how that worked out per se, but I did call him up once two years later and they were still together (”Don’t call me again! Megan will kill me!”).
You’re right, Mary. A good kiss should be much simpler than all that (drama)!
February 25th, 2007 at 2:40 pmGreat blog, Mary, and welcome to RI! We’re so happy to have you with us this week.
Hmmmm….first kiss? A boy when I was 10…and he broke up with me because I wouldn’t “use my tongue”. LOL!
My first “real” kiss, I’d like to forget because he told me that I wasn’t very good. I was 14.
Needless to say, I must have improved because my hubby says I’m darn good.
And of course, he’s been the best kiss. It just means so much more when it is with someone you truly love.
Haven ~ I was LMAO about your “slobbery-mouthed dog”. Too funny!
February 25th, 2007 at 5:07 pmMary, I would totally have to agree with you, a kiss with mushrooms (can anyone say fungus?) would be the worst experience EVER!!! GAG, I hate mushrooms.
What a great blog, everyone’s stories are so funny. I have no great kissing stories. On the other hand, I have no bad kissing stories either, which makes it all good.
February 25th, 2007 at 5:55 pm“kiss off” lol that was funny.. I love Manhattan! It’s so cool that you live there.
It wouldn’t be a deal breaker, but I would hope with time it would get better… if there was something more to the guy of course…
You books sound fabulous, and I can’t wait to read them!!
February 25th, 2007 at 7:50 pmMary, welcome to RI! It’s great to have you here and your blog is really funny!
My first kiss.. Hmm.. I was 15 and he was the cutest boy in the class.. I had a huge crush on him - and he knew it! It was short but sweet.. he also gave me a few more kisses every time we went to a party together, but we never hooked up. But he was with a lot of girls, so that was probably for the best.. hehe
My worst kiss.. one of my ex boyfriends.. He just had the wrong idea of a ‘wet’ kiss.. Haven’s description of a slobbering dog comes to mind.. yuck yuck yuck
My best kiss.. sadly, is my most recent ex who also broke my heart. We didn’t kiss much the last couple of years.. but before that his kisses were the best.. the kind that made your tummy drop and your body tingle.
I love kissing.. I think bad kisses wouldn’t work for me in the long run, cause I’d miss good ones too much. Kissing is just the best *lol*
February 26th, 2007 at 7:02 amMy first kiss was in first grade. It was definitely an eye opener since the little boy in my class french kissed me and I was so grossed out. I had no idea what a french kiss was at that age.
Best kisser would be my husband. He makes my toes curl.
February 26th, 2007 at 7:57 am