Romantic intimacy isn't a topic discussed often, but it needs to be talked about more since it's an essential part of the human experience. It's truly one of the finer things in life and I wish that everyone has a chance to experience it. In order to break the stigma around discussing such a taboo topic, I've decided to write about my personal experience with it and how it has evolved throughout my life. I used to think I'd be fine without becoming close to others romantically and I thought I could save myself major heartbreak by staying unattached. I had this worldview until my senior year of high school when a very close family member died and I realized how emotional I was, which made it easier and more enjoyable to connect with others.

Once I moved away for college, I became more emotionally vulnerable and embraced how passionate I am; This allowed for more space in my life for romantic intimacy. Around this time, I stopped wearing a bra and stopped caring what others thought of me because I became more self-confident than I ever was before. I was finally figuring myself out which made romantic intimacy so much better. Once you know who you are, it's much easier to expose that side to someone else and get to know them on the same level.

The first boy who made me realize how special romantic intimacy can be was John, this lovely guy my friend introduced me to at a house show. He did things as simple as caring about my day and the crazy obscure details of my life (like how my great grandfather essentially had two families so he had to change the family name. Props to John for remembering that one). I’d never had someone interested enough in me to remember obscure details about me like that and I’d never been so comfortable with someone else in such an intimate and romantic manner before. Unfortunately, John moved four hours away from me about two weeks after we met each other and the distance would have been way too much to handle; Long distance relationships hardly ever work out and I doubt it would've ended without us being resentful of each other.

One night, we sat naked across from each other on my tiny loveseat talking about life, our aspirations, our childhoods, and various deep sh*t until the early hours of the morning in which we sleepily stumbled to my bed and cuddled together. You can't even pretend that sh*t isn't like the intimacy you see in movies; I was smitten with him and how he made me feel. We ended up spending a ‘last night’ together at a house show where I watched Creep Creep Janga perform for the first time (that night was when I decided I HAD to photograph them. Funny how life works out, isn’t it?). My point with telling this story is some people can change how you view the world of relationships and romantic intimacy. I wasn’t sure I’d ever want to seriously date someone, but the romantic intimacy I had with John made me realize otherwise; John was always in the moment with me when we were together and we openly talked about our feelings, which is the kind of romantic intimacy that makes my heart sing. John will always have a special place in my heart as the first guy who exposed me to how wonderful being emotionally vulnerable in a romantically intimate way can be. Learning a valuable lesson through our relationships, like the importance of emotional vulnerability, is an important part of the human experience and talking about the valuable things we learn is one way of sharing our humanity with one another. Hopefully, romantic intimacy can become less of a taboo topic through people, like me, writing about our personal experiences with it.