Tiger

My first sexual experience was painful. I'm not circumsized, so the head of my penis is incredibly sensitive. Not so much now as it used to be, because over the years I've pulled back the foreskin frequently, and exposed the tender head to stimulation, the same sort of stimulation that circumsized guys get all thier lives from the moment they get cut as helpless babies. But at the time, at the age of 14, I hadn't really ever pulled the foreskin back, though I had played with it alot. I would stick my finger beneath it and swirl it around, which was not really erotic, but more like a habit of distraction, like twirling my long hair or drumming my fingers on a table-top. Or I would position my foreskin just right so it would look like a mouth, making my erect penis look remarkably like the head of the Alien from the movie Alien, H.R. Giger style, which always amused me. I would also fill my foreskin up with air by creating suction, and make little farting noises by pushing the air out, something I still do to this day. In fact, sometimes when I'm getting it on with some guy, I'll be adjusting my foreskin, just for comfort, and the air trapped beneath it will squeeze out, making very un-sexy noises, through no intention of my own. This is a little embarrassing.

So the first thing this guy did, this 14 year old boy who we called Tiger, mixed black and white, who later developed some sort of physical disorder that required him to walk with a cane, which led him to become a lonely and serious scholar when he went away to college, was to yank the foreskin striaght down. He then proceeded to assault my poor little head with his mouth, in what I assume he thought was a most erotic manner. It hurt. I didn't like it at all. I quickly changed what we were doing, taking control, so I was mostly doing things to him, intentionally not giving him the chance to do very much to me. He came while I was going down on him, which I swallowed, tasting it's salty wateryness , not sure how I felt about it. I was satisfied with the experience, and considered that we were done, but unfortunately he was a very conscientious lover, and had decided that I should be getting off as well. He immediatly began his attack on my dick again, which hurt just as much before, and was really starting to annoy me. Luckily, I was 14, and my erection was not going anywhere, no matter what tortures it endured, so I grabbed it from him immediatly and wanked myself off as quick as I could, which, also because I was 14, happened within seconds.

When we left the bedroom and went out to the living room, our friend Hiedi was listening to Led Zepplin, and crying. It was pretty much agreed by all of us that Hiedi was an attention seeker, who lied, so we didn't pay her antics much mind, and instead we all went down to the park. Tiger played on the jungle gym, while me and Hiedi sat on the swings. I didn't look at Tiger, other than a few glances. He didn't seem to be paying much attention to me either. I don't believe we said more than a few words to each other. But that was normal for us: we didn't really have much in common, save our interest in touching each other, and anyway I wasn't really much of a conversationalist with anyone at that time. My interest in touching him had less to do with me being attracted to him, and more to do with the novelty of it. Eventually we all convened again, trying to decide what we should do, now that the park was proving to be boring. It felt so uncomfortable to be close to him, to be standing in a circle with him, looking at him face to face, that I decided to just go home.

On the way home I knew that I had been rude. That a more mature person would have hung out and talk. I guess I just didn't know what I was supposed to do. My interest in touching him had less to do with actual physical attraction, and more to do with the novelty of it. Now that the novelty was gone, my desire to touch him had gone too, and seeing as I didn't even really like him that much, why make the pretense of wanting to hang out? It was something we did, that was very interesting, but I didn't want to do again. I walked to the bus-stop, feeling out of place in that strage part of town, and feeling very strong and new. The streets, trees, and houses were pale and hazy with bright summer sunshine, and I felt the same. I replayed the events over and over again, not really thinking about them, just marveling, in my serious, unemotional way, that I had done them at all. I wouldn't say I was happy so much as impressed. Not impressed with myself, just with the fact that such things happened at all, not just in my father's pornographic magazines and videos, but in real life. In fact, it seemed to happen rather easily.

I didn't see him for several years after that, and I made no attempt to get in contact with him or find out anything about him. When mutual friends would mention him, I would listen with abstracted interest, but simply shrug in response to any questions about what we had done. The only thing I remember being said about him now was that he had made out with a mousy, mannish girl that was the daughter of the ugliest teacher at our school. I thought it strange. Was he gay, or was he Bi? How could a self-respecting gay man do something so disgusting?

When I did finally see him again, at the age of 19 on a bus heading downtown, he was warm and pleasant, but distant. I don't remember what we spoke of, but I remember actually being interested in what he had to say, and getting the impression that I had made a mistake by ignoring him, and not making the effort to get to know him better. When he got off the bus before me, I was sad, in that wistful, nostalgic way. I was not so much sad to see him go, but more sad at my own dysfunctional way of dealing with people.

I saw him once more, for the last time, at the age of 21. I was at a free concert of Sonic Youth and Stereolab, which seemed to attract every young hipster in the Minneapolis metropolitan area. He was sitting far away from the crowd, dressed all in black, his little dredlocks flopped down on his head, his eyes wide and interested. He leaned his bent back against a brick wall, because he truly needed the support, and balanced his cane between his legs. Again, we talked. He was studying at St. Cloud Univesity, a few hours north of Minneapolis, though I don't remember what. I avoiding mentioning his cane, or his obvious physical disability, although I found it intensely interesting. And again, I don't remember much of what he said, but do remember walking away with the impression that I had screwed up somehow; that an adolescence with him would have been preferable to the adolescene I had actually led, wasting my time losing my mind with a bunch of alcoholic, pot-headed, high-school drop-outs. I wasn't sad this time though. I was happy that my first time was with someone so respectable, and it was interesting for me to think about how mistaken my impressions of someone can be, and how much people can change over the years.

I guess I could draw some sort of moral from this story, but I prefer to just let it be what it was. I didn't really understand it then, nor do I now. The person I was then, 13 years ago, is not the same person I am now either, so any lesson wouldn't really apply to me anyway.