A person’s first kiss is the first big milestone most people experience in life. There’s no forgetting your first kiss -- whether it was good or bad -- and it’s something that once over, seems trivial. But growing up, I always hoped that my first kiss would be like something out of a movie. And boy did the movies have it wrong.
Hollywood has created a “recipe” for instant love to appeal to all the hopeless romantics out there.
1. Either be an insignificant bookworm in the background or a diamond in the rough hidden in a hallway full of people.
2. Stare longingly at the unattainable guy and hope that he’ll notice you.
3. Get noticed.
4. Date for two seconds.
5. Kiss.
6. Boom! Instant love.
Of course there are variations in the pattern, but most romance movies follow this general guideline. The girl always falls for the unbelievably great guy who pursues her, and they live happily ever after. God forbid a girl ask a guy out, or start up a conversation to show she's interested. It's definitely not empowering, there’s little to no acknowledgement for LGBTQ individuals, and it creates a false image of how dating/first kisses work in the real world. For most people, there aren’t any Mia Thermopolis “leg pops” and grand romantic gestures. Here are a few first kiss stories I’ve heard over the last week as I prepared to write this article.
“I was halfway into my front door trying to inside after a horrible blind date when he asked, ‘Can I kiss you?’”
“My first kiss was forced in front of people and our heads bumped and we missed.”
“He just leaned in and I turned my head so his lips met the corner of my mouth and he awkwardly laughed.”
“After our date he just kinda pounced and his teeth hit mine.”
But where was all the foot-popping, all-consuming passion?
Romantic movies like to glance over the initial awkwardness and jump into the romance, and I suppose that’s what makes these movies so popular. Real relationships take work and time to develop. It’s not usually easy or intuitive, but part of being human is learning to handle being uncomfortable and growing from the experience -- and that's something movies rarely show. We're not perfect. Most of us don't look like Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling, and we're 1,000 times more awkward than their characters are in "The Notebook." We don't know all the right words to say, or the right way to act, but we keep trying. We throw ourselves into every new situation and forge through our flaws until we develop the confidence to start again. So while our first kiss (and our lives) may never be just like the movies, it's important to embrace our flawed nature as something that makes us human and just keep swimming.
