{"id":1703,"date":"2013-03-02T01:00:45","date_gmt":"2013-03-02T01:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/?p=1703"},"modified":"2015-03-26T07:02:37","modified_gmt":"2015-03-26T07:02:37","slug":"a-story-is-like-a-kiss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/a-story-is-like-a-kiss\/","title":{"rendered":"A Story is Like a Kiss"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Andy Brucia<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Through great mental discipline, hard work, and a propensity for drink, I have managed to forget most of what I was taught during my college days in the north, and I believe I am a richer person for it.\u00a0 Still, there are those lessons that stick like thorns, and I offer one here in hopes that it will aid in what I have to say, and in the faint hope this memory will be purged by the act of writing it down.<\/p>\n

It begins with my creative writing professor, a complete horse’s ass whose lectures produced the exact substance one would expect from such an orifice, and in comparable amounts.\u00a0 I remember him haranguing me at length for the slow, slovenly manner in which my stories were written.\u00a0 He would say, \u201cI got through your story, and I have a few suggestions.\u201d\u00a0 Got through.\u00a0 He would hand me the bloody thing, red ink practically dripping off my already perfect prose.\u00a0 He marked my local color superfluous!<\/i>, what I saw as adjectival he declared extraneous<\/i>!, and my strolls through the hallowed South of my childhood he rudely called red herrings<\/i>!.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not such an egomaniac to say that my stories did not need work, but the suggestions Professor Yankee made were all about latitude.\u00a0 This failure to appreciate all things Southern was common, both in class and out.\u00a0 I suffered examples of this bias on a daily basis, but a glaring example, and one that northerners might get, began with a question about pigs.<\/p>\n

A group of future leaders gathered to drink beer on a lazy fall afternoon on the same northern university campus.\u00a0 Boys hanging out, and the conversation slowly meandered into the subject of farm animal births.\u00a0 You know how that is.\u00a0 All I remember is there was some confusion among my classmates about pigs and how they gave birth or something.\u00a0 I didn’t listen to the particulars, but there was disagreement and discussion, and then the gang turned to me and was quiet.<\/p>\n

“Well?” they asked expectantly.<\/p>\n

“Well what?”\u00a0 I answered, not understanding.<\/p>\n

“Who’s right about the pigs?” they asked.<\/p>\n

“How in the heck should I know?” I replied.<\/p>\n

“Well, you are from the South,” they responded, clearing up the mystery.\u00a0 Being from the South apparently made me an expert on, among other things, pig births.<\/p>\n

I explained to them that, since the War of Northern Aggression, there were large groups of people living in the South now, and often people live so close together you could see your nearest neighbor’s home.\u00a0 I also mentioned that the street I grew up on was paved, and our house had indoor plumbing.\u00a0 I finished by telling them that, while I had seen one opera and two World Series in this hick town, I had never had the pleasure of witnessing a pig birth.<\/p>\n

Of course, I was the exception, I told them, having traveled into the free states.\u00a0\u00a0 Why, I was just talking to my ol’ friend Huck the other day.\u00a0 He’s a Project Manager now, but we talked about our salad days floating down the `Sippi on a raft, wearing bib overalls, chewing on grass, searching for treasure, freeing slaves.\u00a0 I think they got the point.<\/p>\n

Now my professor would have thought this entire explanation unnecessary, which is exactly why I find it so important.\u00a0 Because, while it is not the story, in a manner it bears on the story, or at least it would in a Southern story.<\/p>\n

But getting back to my professor, I remember the shock I felt looking at my sullied work, as he cited Tolstoy, who at one time or another said that a story should start in the middle somewhere, `in the action’ I believe was the phrase my professor chose.\u00a0 I doubt Tolstoy ever said such a thing.\u00a0 Tolstoy talking about brevity is like Mother Teresa talking about sexual technique.<\/p>\n

I told him I was fairly certain that Tolstoy was not from the South.\u00a0 In the South, a story is usually about fifteen or twenty minutes old before the beginning<\/i> is even a distant speck on a misty horizon.\u00a0 I also told him that a point<\/i> in a Southern story (he used the word climax<\/i>, a much too sexy a word for my ears) was as rare as a cool August in Alabama.<\/p>\n

My voice rose as my grade fell, and I snatched my story from his hands, tore up the first three pages and handed it back to him.\u00a0 I told him that now he certainly had the middle.\u00a0 In as strong a voice as I could muster, I said, \u201cA story isn\u2019t something you get through<\/i>.\u00a0 A story is like a kiss.\u201d<\/p>\n

He rubbed his chin, looking at my story, thinking about what I said.\u00a0 His mouth began to form a question, but I interrupted him.\u00a0 I figured my grade was toast, and I had already decided to drop as I continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cA story isn\u2019t something you get through, even if you have sixty-eight of them on your desk, even if someone is paying you to read them instead of paying you to write them, which you thought would happen.\u00a0 You get<\/i> to read stories, see?\u00a0 It\u2019s a privilege.\u00a0 But you have to be open to it, like a kiss.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just telling my friend Anita this the other day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eater Anita, we called her.\u00a0 We all had tried to date her, for lack of a nicer term.\u00a0 She had gorgeous eyes, beautiful long black hair and a lovely personality, none of which we noticed because of her fantastic breasts.\u00a0 She was known for her equally fantastic appetite, and Dairy Queen wasn\u2019t going to close the deal.\u00a0 My chronic lack of money quickly took me out of the running for Anita\u2019s carnal attentions, allowing us to become fast-food friends.<\/p>\n

My professor had apparently noticed Anita as well, and had taken her out to dinner the previous Saturday night.\u00a0 Over burgers, Anita had given me a blow-by-blow account of their date.\u00a0 With these details firmly in mind, I continued my comments on story writing and kissing, using his Saturday night date so to get my point across that much better.\u00a0 Always know your audience.\u00a0 Bet Tolstoy said that, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cA kiss isn\u2019t something to suffer through, either, even if someone spends, say, seventy-five dollars on your dinner.\u00a0 I said to my friend, Anita, you don\u2019t owe him three minutes of tonsil hockey or a quick feel, even if you did eat enough to, if not choke a horse, then make him inclined to clear his throat.\u00a0 That isn\u2019t a kiss, that is a contractual agreement, trading payment- shrimp cocktail appetizer, prime rib, baked potato, ceasar salad, three wines and Key Lime pie – for a service.\u00a0 If hard-earned cash had been exchanged instead of dinner and spit, and had a mouth ended up at another anatomical location, up here they call it prostitution.\u00a0 Down south we call it Saturday night.\u201d<\/p>\n

I grinned.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t.\u00a0 I decided to head straight over to registration to see if I could still drop at this late date.<\/p>\n

But the point is that bad kissers make bad readers, and vice versa.\u00a0 It is through this transitive property and Anita\u2019s detailed report that I know that my professor must have been a bad kisser.<\/p>\n

You get through a long dental appointment.\u00a0 You get through a prison term.\u00a0 You get through a war, a republican presidency.\u00a0 You don\u2019t get through a short story.\u00a0 You don\u2019t get through a kiss.<\/p>\n

A kiss is one of those things you have to be true in.\u00a0 You can have no expectations.\u00a0 You have to clear everything else out of your mind and heart, and not think about whether your deodorant is working or what the future holds or what baggage you carry.\u00a0 There is only one moment, and it is here, waiting on your lips and on hers. \u00a0You have to be willing to put yourself out there and get nothing back.\u00a0 If you have an agenda, believe me, it will be on the tip of your tongue, so to speak.\u00a0 If you have reservations, there is nothing you can do to hide them.\u00a0 If you don\u2019t feel the same way, it will show.\u00a0 If you are looking to get through a kiss, do yourself and someone else a favor and just stop, smile, shake hands, and say goodnight.<\/p>\n

A story isn\u2019t something you witness, it certainly isn\u2019t something you get through.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t something you hear.\u00a0 The writing part is only half of any story, the other half is what happens to the reader when they hold still for a goddamn minute and let it reach them.\u00a0 If you aren\u2019t up for that, if you can\u2019t quiet your mind down enough to meet the writer here, then put the damn thing down.\u00a0 But if you are, and the timing is just right, it can change everything.\u00a0 Just like a kiss.<\/p>\n

I believe I learned something despite myself at that school.\u00a0 It is a tendency of mine to start at what I think of as the beginning, and amble around into this and that charming backstory.\u00a0 I am not trying on purpose to delay the actual story, which I must at this point confess this still is not, and I do realize now that what I have offered so far might be seen as a delay of sorts to some people.\u00a0 For this reason, I do apologize, and heretofore I will endeavor to speed up the process for the benefit of the broad audience.<\/p>\n

The story goes that Momma made a secret promise to herself as an adolescent girl that she would obtain carnal knowledge with the first man she saw buck naked from the front.\u00a0 It was late summer, and she was seventeen.\u00a0 She worked hard on the farm before school and after, and the work was turning her into a lovely young woman.<\/p>\n

On weekends, Betty (Momma’s name is Betty) would go to the local dances.\u00a0 Her straight, strong back and fine figure held up her summer dresses well, and the young men flocked to her like, well, like horny young Southern men.<\/p>\n

After returning from these dances, I imagine her laying in her dark room, thinking of what those graceful boys\u2019 arms would feel like around her naked body, their hands on her, her legs all akimbo, stuff like that.\u00a0 Think a minute about your momma that way and imagine how I feel.<\/p>\n

She had seen plenty of penises.\u00a0 Little cute ones on babies, small ones on boys swimming naked in the lake on the McCreary farm.\u00a0 Penises on horses that seemed ridiculous.\u00a0 Penises on drunk streaking football players running through a party, men pissing on walls, in a magazine, even her grandpas sagging stuff once when helping him from the tub.<\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t get it.\u00a0 None of those penises did a thing for her, though she couldn\u2019t say the same for the boys themselves.\u00a0 Anyway, on one of those hot summer nights, the story goes that my momma promised herself that the first time she saw a fully naked man, she would drop trow or dress or whatever right then and there and find out once and for all what all these hot feelings were for.<\/p>\n

As Momma wasn\u2019t routinely presented with frontal male nudity on her daily travels, things went on much as they had before Momma made this promise to herself.\u00a0 She dated politely the few shy, goofy boys who asked her out, occasionally kissing them but fending off their searching hands and long tongues.<\/p>\n

But it was only a matter of time.<\/p>\n

Her brother, my Uncle Rooney, was in high school as well and on the wrestling team.\u00a0 One day after practice, Rooney and his friend Phil went out for a run to try to sweat off the last few pounds before their meet on Friday.\u00a0 They returned after the run to Rooney’s and my Momma\u2019s house and got cleaned up to go out that night.<\/p>\n

Phil was in the bathroom washing up and changing clothes, looking at his naked body in the mirror.\u00a0 He was a lanky, pale teenager with acne both painful to have and to look at.\u00a0 As he looked in the mirror, maybe his penis (his<\/i> father called it Johnson<\/i>) hung slightly to the left, and Phil was worried something was wrong with it.\u00a0 He might have tugged at it to see if he could get it to hang straight down, but it wouldn’t.\u00a0 It probably had changed a lot in the past few years, and maybe Phil pushed and arranged his curly black pubic hair so as to get a better look at his changing penis.<\/p>\n

This is of course conjecture.\u00a0 I don’t know what occurred in that bathroom, I wasn’t there, but I’ve heard of fellas who have thought, felt and done similar things.<\/p>\n

What is not conjecture is that downstairs, Betty came flying in the front door and bolted for the bathroom in urgent need.\u00a0 She did not knock as she attempted to enter the downstairs bathroom, but it was locked with her mother, my grandma, inside reading, having five minutes to herself.<\/p>\n

Betty flew up the steps three at a time and burst in on Phil examining himself, and found that she suddenly didn’t have to go.\u00a0 Phil stood in shock, yelling `Get outta here, Betty!’ (they had met), his hands cupped over his privates.\u00a0 But it was too late; mom saw it<\/i>, and though seeing a penis might bring a lot of different things to different minds, for my Mom Betty it brought to mind her promise.\u00a0 She shut the door behind her, ignoring Phil’s shouts.\u00a0 Transfixed by what she was seeing, she reached for the buttons of her blouse, but she couldn’t unbutton them and frankly had no urge to.\u00a0 Still, her promise gnawed at her, as she was never the kind of person who gave up on a promise easily.\u00a0 She searched for solutions as Phil called for help and covered himself.<\/p>\n

Quickly Rooney came running to see what was up, and Grandma also appeared on the scene to see her daughter leaving the bathroom and an almost naked teenage boy yelling.\u00a0 Grandma turned to her daughter for an explanation.<\/p>\n

Up to that point, it had not occurred to Betty that she would have had to break with her Christian upbringing to keep this promise to herself, so her mind quickly searched and found an acceptable compromise between her word and God.<\/p>\n

“I have to marry Phil, Mother,” Momma said to my Grandmother, and from what I have heard, I believe that if my father had not been a fast dresser and a pretty fair wrestler, he would never have been able to get out of that bathroom, down the front stairs and out of that house alive.\u00a0 But he did, and although momma could have had her pick of a lot flashier guys than my dad Phil, and could have changed her mind about the whole thing, she kept her promise to herself and chose Phil, my Daddy.<\/p>\n

Anyway, that is what she would tell to everyone else.\u00a0 But around the kitchen table, on nights that were just ours, school nights doing homework or after days doing chores, she would look at across at my Daddy, then at us kids, and tell the other story, the true story.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course I could have changed my mind,\u201d Momma says.\u00a0 \u201cIt was a promise I made, but I was seventeen and not five and I knew I was talking about my life.\u00a0 We agreed to go on a date.\u00a0 You tell it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daddy smiled and continued.\u00a0 \u201cI liked your Momma since sixth grade, but I was shy and she wasn\u2019t, and she made me a little uncomfortable.\u00a0 She would look straight at you when she was talking, which was always, with those big blue eyes looking at you, she was just so pretty it made it hard to concentrate.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t notice any problem now,\u201d Momma interjected.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot true, Betty\u2026What was I saying?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFunny man.\u00a0 Tell the story.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRight.\u00a0 We went out that Saturday night.\u00a0 It couldn\u2019t have gone worse.\u00a0 I was late to pick her up.\u00a0 We went to a dance, and lord knows I can\u2019t dance.\u00a0 I was sweating like crazy. \u00a0Between dances, she talked and I nodded, and dabbed myself with napkins.\u00a0 It was hot and loud, and I wanted to just get out of there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut she did this thing.\u00a0 We were walking toward the door, and she heard a song or something.\u00a0 As she turned back toward the dance floor, she reached out her hand, and touched my arm, then her hand slid down into my hand, and I held on, and so did she.\u00a0 She turned and looked at me, straight at me like she does, and this time I didn\u2019t look away.\u201d<\/p>\n

They looked right at each other and smiled.\u00a0 The hair on my arm always stands up when they tell that part.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I kissed her, right next to the dance floor.\u00a0 First date, in public.\u00a0 I wanted to close any gap between us, so I kissed her.\u00a0 Sweaty, shy clumsy me.\u00a0It wasn\u2019t the kind of thing I was exactly known for, and she wasn\u2019t a girl who would kiss a boy if she didn\u2019t want to, in public or any other place.\u00a0 I expected a punch in the chops.\u00a0 And she kissed me back.\u00a0 Pretty much, that was that.\u201d<\/p>\n

They both smiled.\u00a0 I wanted my professor to know this somehow, that this is where you have to be to read a story, or to kiss, either one.\u00a0 You have to be open to it.\u00a0 You have to be ready for it, but not ready for it at all.\u00a0 You have to expect everything to go bad, and open to it when it doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Momma would later describe sexual relations as no big thing, and said her ideas and feelings prior to sex were overblown, so you can imagine how Dad feels most of the time.\u00a0 Still, it amazes me that their marriage actually works pretty well, and maybe the first penis you see is as good a criteria for a union as any.<\/p>\n

Another thing that professor told me was that once I had reached my climax, quickly wind things up.\u00a0 I told him down South we liked to get wound up before we reached the climax, and smoke a nice cigar or maybe sip some Kentucky bourbon after.\u00a0 It’s a truly different world up there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Andy Brucia Through great mental discipline, hard work, and a propensity for drink, I have managed to forget most of what I was taught during my college days in the north, and I believe I am a richer person … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":97,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2013-edition","category-prose"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/97"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1703"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2074,"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1703\/revisions\/2074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentweb.bellevuecollege.edu\/belletrist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}