A Lost Art?

Inspired by a post from MB about "the lean-in", a post by Glib and events of this past weekend, I've decided to make this posting about kissing, or for MB, snogging.

This past weekend was a Marquette Rugby Alumni weekend. Yes, I played rugby and yes, I am straight. Shocking, I know. Someone has to be the token. Anyway, the weekend was back in Milwaukee and it coincided with not only Summerfest, but Lake Front 7s. Lake Front 7s is a rugby 7s tournament. Without going into too much detail about rugby, here's a brief synopsis. Rugby is generally played with 15 players per side and 40 minute halves. 7s rugby is with 7 people per side and 7 minute halves. Typically very fast paced and involves tons of running, so those of us who are forwards don't particularly care for it because we're fat and slow. Or maybe I'm just speaking for myself, though I know there are other forwards out there that will agree with me.

Anyway, of course there was a huge party after the tournament. Rugby and drinking? Who'd of thunk? Towards the end of the evening I was chatting with one guy, E. E was pretty cool. Of course, he was also pretty drunk. Most folks were. Anyway, E and I were hanging out chatting for a long time. However, as the evening wore on, we started having the same conversation over and over and over again because genius couldn't remember we'd had it 5 minutes before. Now, if I had been drunk that probably would have been ok. However, I wasn't, so it got a bit old after a while. It eventually reached the point in the evening where he said, "You are a beautiful woman. I want to make love to you." Well, there you have it. So I was forced to tell him that though I was flattered, I'm not a random sex kind of girl. We discussed it for a bit (meaning he kept trying and I kept saying no) and he finally realized he wasn't getting anywhere. However, we still hung out and kept talking. Later as he got up to go use the facilities, he tried to kiss me. Actually, that's not entirely accurate. He tried to determine if I still had my tonsils or if my stomach could indeed be found at the bottom of my esophogus. I swear to you, as he was leaning in, his tongue was already out of his mouth. SO not attractive at all.

I started reflecting on it on the plane ride home as women are wont to do. It made me wonder - Why is it a good number of men always feel the need to shove their tongues down your throat? Do they not realize that not every kiss requires tongue? I have had some amazing kisses where tongue wasn't involved. Don't get me wrong, I like the tongue as much as the next person. It's a very useful thing. But it doesn't always have to be used to play "swirly-swirly, pokey-pokey, let's check out the back of your throat" when you're kissing someone. I don't want to come out of a kiss and have to wipe my mouth because you're saliva is now all around it. That was one thing when we were 15. Not at this age.

So, as Glib would say, "Note to all single men out there" - when you're kissing someone, you don't always have to try and shove your tongue down their throat. It's not tonsil hockey kids, it's kissing. You're supposed to be turning someone on, not drooling all over them.

This moment of Dear Abbey has been brought to you by the letter R and the number 3.