Seeing as the New Year is approaching and with it the common proclivity to draw up lofty, mostly unrealistic goals and personal policies, it seemed strangely appropriate for me to first confess to my failings as touching the goals of the closing year. I shall address each in its on post and title them in the following format "On failed resolutions: xyz", providing of course,I get to writing about another one after this.
I used to be a fan of Television in time past but, for a while now it has only gotten on my nerves. I read a quote somewhere a few years ago, the author of which I cannot recall, that said "I find the television to be a truly educating appliance. When one is turned on, I move into an adjoining room and read a book". Of course I do not share such a radical dislike for TV; I still love the Discovery Channel, National Geographic, CNN etc. Anyway as a kid I absolutely loved "The Wonder Years of Kevin Arnold" and "Doogie Howser" above almost every other show. Kevin and I walked hand-in-hand through his thoroughly riveting tale of imagined romances, filial bonds, uneven battles etc etc. I guess I even had a thing for his girlfriend Winnie which might have badly bruised our fantastical friendship had the series not gotten unceremoniously yanked off TV.
While I yet nursed the agony of losing Kevin, along came my namesake Doogie Howser. He was of course a radically different character – a prodigy who scored perfect in the SAT at the age of 6 (I think) and went on to become an M.D at 14 or 15. Doogie, despite an inability to relate with his peers (with the exception of his faithful friend Vincent) had to find love amongst them if he were not to send some older lady to jail for the felony of having sex with a minor. And so he, with the help of Vince and his girlfriend whose name I do not recall, began to learn a little of what it meant to be a real 15 yr old.
In one episode, Doogie had a misunderstanding with his girlfriend and felt she was being irrational (aren't they all most of the time?). They were on the brink of a break-up and while he was sitting solitarily in his room close to the end of that week's episode, his father walked in and, while offering him advice, closed with this statement which I have never since forgotten – "No matter how prodigious your intellect, the conundrum of women is a difficult thing to grasp".
Vincent, it turned out, had been eavesdropping from just outside the window and as soon as the elder Dr. Howser took leave of his son, he came charging in, his eyes straining at their sockets, whispering in muffled excitement "YOU GRASPED HER CONUMDRUMS???!!!" Of course Vincent knew nothing of what the word meant so I would suppose, knowing his character, that having isolated the last syllable of the word 'Conundrums' he naturally associated it with the first component of her anatomy he found to be likewise rounded and plural.
It was a stroke of ingenious tomfoolery that never left my memory since I watched it as a kid. And as is the case when a thing is lodged so firmly in a crevice of the mind it came tumbling out of my mouth on the faithful day when I made the first step in abandoning my long-standing sexual fortress to the knackers (yes, there are also men out there who don't take the subject of sex lightly). For the purpose of this post, I shall call her Eros – in reverence of the almost messianic purpose of mind with which she schooled me on the ins and outs, the subtleties and vagaries of sex when she learned the 'shocking' truth that I had had no previous experience of it.
During our first encounter, Eros waited patiently for us to be alone then asked tentatively, after much pointless preamble 'How long have you been a Christian?'
'Probably since I was old enough to understand what it was about .' I replied, 'But I've been pretty much a heathen this past year and I'm trying to find my feet again' I added with a laugh.
'Are you a 'V'?' She enquired.
'What in the world are those?' I asked, assuming my blankest poker-face. Of course I was merely feigning ignorance to stall while I frantically searched for an appropriate answer.
'I mean... like a...'virgin'' She breathed the last word; softly, deferentially.
'Oh of course not' I replied with a wave of the hand 'There've been a few mortal sins strewn around my Christian walk.' That was another lie. And yes, I do speak like this in real life.
Apparently I underestimated the quality of my poker-face for after a bit more bland chit-chat Eros impassively straddled me and gave me what turned out, unbeknownst to her, to be my first (and I might add, quite efficient) lesson on how not to kiss.
'Might I possibly feel your pompoms?' I ventured matter-of-factly, as though there were something remotely suave about my choice of words.
Eros for reasons yet mystifying to me, found that endearing and allowed me.
In retrospect, I consider that to have been the point where the proverbial cookie crumbled. I popped my cherry – shredded it actually - and then proceeded to tell her that I was indeed the letter of the alphabet she had tried to classify me with earlier on. Her facial muscles tightened abruptly as she absorbed the news. Gradually, they eased into stage after stage of conflicting emotion – befuddlement, admiration, wonder... anger.
'Why the f#$k didn't you tell me' She fumed, making me flinch almost visibly, as I'm not the biggest fan of the 'f' word.
'What on earth does that have to do with anything? And how did you expect me to say it seeing as our positions ought normally to be reversed?' I retorted, adding with an extra silly falsetto 'Oh Eros, receive me gently...I'm a 'V'?'
'Whatever!' Came the still livid response 'You should have told me! I this I that, blah blah blah whatever whatever' And we continued this lame back-ing and forth-ing over what I was convinced was an inconsequential issue.
I think she really found it hard to reconcile my physical appearance with these 'outlandish' principles I espoused. Well, eventually when tempers where calmed she made some remark about how she could never have told from the way I did 'it', and then proceeded to initiate several months of wild, uninhibited, ridiculously postured and, in my case, loveless sex.
Larry Wilde, in one of his jokes told of a Frenchman who while arduously trading yarns with an American about all the sexual positions he'd experimented with, ended his ridiculous tirade with a position which had the woman hanging up-side-down from a chandelier. When he was done the American began his tales with the 'missionary' position. Said he 'well first, there's one where you lay the chick on her back and you lie on top of her...'; before he could go any further, the Frenchman interjected, whooping in stark wonder 'oo la la..zees I 'ave never heard before'. The preceding accurately describes my tryst with Eros.
Don't get me wrong though, it's not something I endorse. It was a huge mistake; the result of a gradual lowering of my standards over the preceding months. It was a mistake that, as I expected, took me many times more effort to correct than to make. I have always been a rather 'religious' person and thus I was myself bewildered at the abruptness of my about-face. Case in point; when I got home that night after callously ripping my cherry to shreds, I all but propped my eyelids open with my fingers to keep myself from falling asleep because I was gripped by a quiet but very real conviction that I would die in my sleep.
I hung with the boys, played Xbox, watched movies, star-gazed, and all the while silently begged God for mercy – to my mind I was doomed. I don't know when or how I eventually dozed off but it was with great pleasure that I welcomed the familiar dull early morning headache – I was alive. However several more acrobatic sessions with Eros made me rather cocky, but I tried hard to set things right eventually. One can never really forget who one is and where one comes from. We may stray abroad sometimes but when we do, it is because we condition ourselves to be content with the feathery whispers - whether real or imagined, be they ever so soft - of home lingering, ubiquitous, in every flowing draught. When the pangs grew too strong for me, I knew it was time to retrace my steps...and thankfully I did.
What resolution did I break? It was that of simple obedience to my faith; I had grown lukewarm, yes, but I'd suspected myself for a while to be on the brink of doing something silly. Of course I fell wildly wide of my stated goal. I guess I should never have indulged the first few innuendoes that so casually flew amidst our conversations. But then what the heck, people have those all the time – I must say I find it rather intriguing. Truth be told, the trouble really began when I grasped those conundrums...
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