Millenials Clearly Need a Guide to Kissing

After listening to Emma Court's essay, A Millennial's Guide to Kissing via Modern Love Podcast, I took an introspective moment to consider several instances in which, I have behaved counter-intuitively to the prospect of romantic love. Her tale illustrates how millennials are more willing to walk away with the "only-for-tonight" mindset than to face the opportunity to lean boldly into sustaining the connection or the spark that we might have felt with a stranger. Although these moments are rare and fleeting, I have regretfully so let these fragile moments slip through my fingers, leaving only the residue of "what'if" in its wake.

I flash back vividly to a moment in which I met a special person, who I instantly connected with from the moment he approached me, asking, "what are you doing over here alone?" Although, I accepted his advances and have since had the opportunity to feel more than "just outside my grasp", it was not without internal battles. I can tune back into the conversations I had with friends within that first week of making his acquaintance. And I remember specifically hoping to be talked out of following deeper down this illuminated path to see what might be further ahead. I made statements to my friends like, "it's such a bad idea for me to go on a date with him right?", and "maybe I shouldn't go because I have a feeling that I will really like this guy." In hindsight, what kind of horseshit was that?

We watch these fairy-tales that ultimately go as, girl meets boys in a chance meet-cute, they have some sort of problems in between, and then the two characters live happily ever after. One would think that this external programming would motion us towards the "live happily ever after portion", but for some reason, we get stuck somewhere between the meet-cute and just before the problem stage in the plot. Fortunately, the powers that be tugged so fiercely in his direction, that I gave in and agreed to this date to see what this mysterious stranger was all about. My reward? Getting to meet an incredibly considerate and genuine human being and having the privilege of getting a peek into someone else's life. The outcome could have been much different, but it wasn't and for that, even if today was the last day that I got to experience his presence, then I would already be over my head in gratitude.