Kiss a Boy

When I was just into my teens, our family would go on vacation for two weeks in Hollywood Fla. We had never gone on a real vacation before, spending our holiday time at my grandmother’s cottage usually. I guess mom and dad had a little more discretionary income they needed to dispose of as I got older. God knows they didn’t spend it on good haircuts or stylish clothing for their youngest son.

I had been to the US before when we would visit uncles and aunts that lived in Ohio. I liked everything about the USA, they had candy bars that we didn’t, cherry cola, mini golf and archery ranges open year round. There was also my second cousin Debbie that I had a major crush on. She tolerated her cousins from Canada, the retarded giant country to the north, and we managed to have fun. At the time, I figured that the US was at least ten years ahead of Canada socially, economically and pretty much any other way you could measure. I always had a great time in Ohio.

Meanwhile, Florida was an unknown. It was the US of course but it also stayed warm year round and of course there was that ocean. I was beyond sand castles for the most part when we went down the first time and I was just a smidge too early to talk to girls. I appreciated them from afar and they looked wonderful in bathing suits. It didn’t help that I tagged along behind my older brother and the friends he made down there. He had no problem with being shy and consequently the girls tended to hover around the “cool guys” and the little brother.

I spent a lot of time wandering up and down the boardwalk, sun tanning and looking for shells. Come to think about it, it’s been fifty years and I still do the same thing when I am at a beach. I may not be advancing in this life, but I’m not slipping backwards either. There was this cafe I liked to spend time in, but I think I have written about it before, nice place.

Anyways, two days before we had to leave, I did manage to meet a girl. Looking back, I suspect that she just got fed up with my brother and his asshole friends and wanted to spend time with the quiet, shy guy walking along the beach. I fell pretty hard for Lois. She was the first girl that I ever thought about in a romantic way and the first girl to want to kiss me. Of course there were promises to write, phone calls at the time were far too expensive, and a few letters went back and forth across the border. Several months went by then a year and then fifty. I still remember Lois Alquist and can’t help but hope that life has been good to her.

I wonder if it would have made a difference if when we met there was email, facebook and Skype to make keeping in touch that much easier. Kids today must get in long distance romance situations. Is it easier for them to keep in touch or harder for them to forget that vacation fling? I guess I will have to wait until Hurricane, Tornado and Tsunami get old enough for those holiday romances. I will also have to hope they are comfortable enough with Poppa to tell me about their budding love lives.

I just know that Tsunami will kiss a boy one day and he will still be thinking about her fifty years later.