I Know I Am, But What Are You?

Sex with my first boyfriend was a little bit like learning how to put in a tampon, but only half as enjoyable!

I can agree in principle that it's the thought that counts when giving or getting gifts, but I would also like to point out that "if there's no thought...it doesn't count." I don't wish to be reminded that you didn't want to take the time to get to know me, or perhaps you have even known me my whole life and simply don't care about me. All I ask is that you not rub my face in it.

And since I was basically being raised by senior citizens at the time, my physical activity was limited to driving around the park to look at the trees, driving to the lake to look at the lake, and driving to the mall to look at coats that were “car length.” My

I didn't have the energy to scream at the flasher or yell for security. And besides, the 'security team' was just a bunch of tanned strippers in peekabook bikini briefs and heels. So I took matters into my own hands. 'Thank God you're here. Get on top of me right now and force-feed me all of that man meat!' I shouted at him. 'Your penis is irresistible to me! I must have it in my body right this minute!' I started to back him into a corner. 'No, don't put it back inside your pants! I require all of the services you are offering me. I request that you inspect my vaginables and see if they meet your exacting standards!' As I pulled my own pants down, he ran out of the building, never so scared in his life.

As it turns out, the whole place was a purgatory for gray-haired widows and divorced men, content to eat frozen dinners and watch Deep Space Nine until they fell asleep alone and covered in potato chip crumbs.

I recall enthusiastically using my employee discount to buy a massive gold-framed print of two postcoital leopards. I originally intended to hang it over my futon bed, but I thought it sent the wrong message to all my potential suitors.

It took me five minutes of awkward silence to come up with an answer, but upon careful consideration, I told her that my perfect job would entail spending the day in a cushiony room, napping with baby animals. Maybe they had been abandoned by their mothers of left by the side of the road; whatever their situation, it would be my job to keep them company and pet them and generally give them a warm motherly vibe. When they wanted to play and roll around on the floor, I would do that with them, and then when they got tired, they could fall asleep in the crook of my arm or snuggled in my blouse. And sometimes I would give them a warm bottle, just like in all the nature specials. But they would definitely have to be baby animals. I wasn't about to get scratched or nipped or anything - I'm no St. Francis.

Nothing could compare to the youthful vigor I applied to rummaging around in their private stuff to find incriminating evidence against them. With the methodical thoroughness of a CSI and the maniacal determination of an SS, I ransacked whole rooms for evidence of their drug use - like a junkie looking for smack, except that if I actually found smack, I probably would have called the police on them and initiated the process of emancipating myself, just to be a bitch about it.

When I got home at four o'clock in the morning on a school night, I shoved my mother awake and coolly hissed: 'I missed all my exams, I sprained my hand. Expect a call from the school. Go back to sleep.

One evening, as I carefully prepared my dollies for bed with their silky pajamas and pin curls, my mom literally threw a red book at me from across the room with a 'Here. Read this. Let me know if you have any questions.' It took me half a day to get through, and afterward, oh, did I have questions. The book contained the most explicit descriptions of every sexual proclivity in existence - I had a lot of questions: 'Is it the man that pees on the woman or the woman that pees on the man?' 'What if you forget your safe word?' 'Do we have any shlurp bars in Toronto?' 'What's your safe word?' 'What if you go to shrimp someone and they haven't washed their feet?' 'What should my safe word be? Is alphabet soup to obvious?' Soon, not only was I familiar with the basics of male-female sexual intercourse, I could explain in great detail what bukkake was. I could give you a rundown on a Cincinnati Bowtie, or perhaps even take you through the intricacies of a German Scheisse video.

My self-directed ensembles were usually some confused attempt to combine the uniforms of the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders with the somber aspect of a Portuguese widow.

But instead, my father sat us down for an explanation of lesbianism.... ...I was mortified, and looked over at my girlfriend to see if this was all registering with her, but she was too busy daydreaming to notice the runaway train that was thundering thought the motel room. She hadn't spoken a single word to any of the adults so far on the trip, and even when she occasionally spoke to me, it was in such a eerily quiet tone that only a nine-year-old- girl or a dog could hear it. I'm pretty sure that Bob and Donna thought she was a deaf-mute, albeit one who could miraculously sense the vacuum seal breaking on a can of Pringles from a mile away. I was eager to let the whole thing go, when my friend asked casually, 'But what's munching the carpet got to do with anything?