Hi Sars,

I’ve only just been reading your column for a few months, but I always find your advice honest and straight-on.

To get to my question, I’m 21 and still haven’t had a boyfriend, much less been kissed. My close friends know this (I don’t publicize this information to most people because, well, it’s a bit embarrassing), though I don’t really talk about it much with them, and I’d ask them what to do in this case, except I don’t want to be parading my lack of experience in front of them. Also, as far as I know, there are no good reasons (i.e., a second head or whatnot) why this experience hasn’t happened for me yet; it just hasn’t happened.

I’ve found someone whom I click with, someone who just may end up being my first boyfriend. We’ve known each other since August and have been friends since, though I hadn’t felt this way about him until a few weeks ago. Nothing has happened yet, and we haven’t discussed the potential for our friendship to develop into something more, but I have a hunch that an opportunity is going to arise soon.

With this opportunity, though, comes the chance that we might kiss. I’m a bit nervous because of the lack of kissing experience, and I don’t know what I should do at that moment to avoid acting dorky or like an adolescent. Any advice on how to keep my first kiss memorable in a positive way?

Signed,
Needing a road map out of No-Man’s Land

Dear Map,

The good news here is that a lot of first kisses are awkward — even when the participants have kissed other people before, they haven’t kissed each other yet, so chances are he won’t be able to tell you’ve never done it before.

But you’ll know, of course, and when his face is heading for yours, it’s really hard not to spazz — you have an idea of what’s coming, but you don’t know exactly, and you don’t want to screw it up, blah blah blah, so the main thing is to just try to stay calm.Breathe evenly through your nose, and try to view it as an anthropological experiment.The tongue is going to feel kind of weird and kind of wrong at first, but keep breathing and go with it.

The other thing to remember is that a little nervous giggling or twitching isn’t necessarily bad.Jitters about kiss mean that it means something to you, and that won’t escape his notice; in fact, he’ll probably find it endearing.

In any case, don’t overthink it.You’ll do fine.

Dear Sars:

My daughter, K, is 11 years old.Her father, A, and I were very young when she was born, and for various reasons, I did not marry him.As a baby, K spent occasional weekends and holidays with A.When K was one, I decided to move out of state, to be near my sister and my best friend.Although A was hurt by my decision, he did nothing to stop it.Aside from a few letters and two visits when K was a toddler, she has had no contact with her father.At the time we moved, A was 19, with limited resources, and the geographical distance and his immaturity made it became easier for him to drift away from his daughter.A’s mother has told me that it is the shame and guilt over ten years of neglect that keeps him from trying to see K now.I suspect that he thinks about her often and wishes he had done things differently.

I have raised K on my own without support (monetary or otherwise) from him or his family.I am still a single mom, but we have a good life and a great support system in my family.We have kept in touch with A’s mom and sisters and K sees them several times a year, but we rarely discuss A, or his lack of involvement in K’s life.I have never kept K from A and I have been careful not to disparage A in front of her.I have no anger or resentment towards A and view his absence in our lives as his loss, not ours.

Four years ago, we moved back to our home state, where A still lives.Last year, K told me that she wanted to see A, and expressed her fear that something might happen to him and she would never get the chance to know her father.I wrote to A, in care of his mother, letting him know K is interested in getting to know him.I told him that the past years are water under the bridge and that he would be welcome in our lives.I didn’t tell K of my letter, to spare her disappointment if he didn’t respond.

Six months later, I still haven’t heard from A.I have not asked his mom whether or not he got my letter, but I suspect he did.If it were just my interests at stake, I would let it go and not give it another thought.But my daughter truly wants to meet her father, and I feel strongly that it should be her choice whether or not to have a relationship with him.Should I make a second effort?Should I let it go?Should I let K write to him? I think he’d be more likely to respond to her, but there is still the chance of rejection that could be devastating to her.

Any thoughts, advice, opinions, et cetera?

Sincerely,
K’s Mom

Dear Mom,

I’ll tell you what I think you should do, and then I’ll tell you why.

First, call or write to A’s mom and ask if A got the letter.Stress that you don’t want to put her in the middle, and that she doesn’t have to get into the specifics of A’s reaction; you just want to know if he got the letter.Don’t give her a message for A.Don’t get into the possibility of K writing to him herself.Just get a yes-or-no answer to that one question.

You probably already know the answer — he got the letter, all right, but he’s declined to get in touch with either of you.And you should share that answer with K.

Yes, she’s still young, and yes, it’s going to hurt both of you for her to hear it.But the thing is, she already knows A isn’t committed to participating in her life, because he doesn’t, and he never has in her memory.He’s just not around.K knows what that means, but she wants to get to know him on her own terms, and you should support her in that, even if she’s risking disappointment.Supporting her is probably going to translate to managing her expectations and not sugarcoating what you already know about her father’s behavior, because if he’s really kind of gutless and irresponsible, or just doesn’t want to deal with her for whatever reason, she’s going to have to face that eventually anyway.But in a lot of ways, she’s already faced it, so while protecting her is a noble instinct, I don’t think you need to.She knows he’s had choices, and that he’s made certain choices regarding her.

I don’t have kids, I don’t have a degree in child psychology, and I can’t say for sure how much difficult truth K can handle about her father at her age.But it’s my sense that, if A isn’t interested, K is better off finding that out now, and figuring out a way to deal with it now.

Dear Sars:

I was married earlier in the year — my husband and I
met in college
and were together three years before we tied the knot.
I love his
parents…his mother especially. We’re genuinely
friends. We go
shopping, we go to movies, we hang out, we even work
together in the
same office. Hubs and I get along blissfully. I have
only one slight
cloud hovering over my marital bliss.

We live in the same town as my in-laws, and go over to
their house
several times a week, at least, for dinner. If we
can’t make it
because of prior engagements, class, or sometimes just
because we
don’t feel like it, his mother flips out. She has to
make sure
everything is okay, and the next day at work makes a big
deal over how
much she missed having us. Which is all well and good,
only sometimes
I get the feeling that she thinks I am influencing her
son into
spending less time with her and his father. This is
not the case.
Sometimes we are just busy, sometimes we need some
down time.
Sometimes it’s HIS idea that we not go. His mom can’t
understand that
there is such a thing as too much togetherness.

The holidays are more of the same. We live 200 miles
from my family,
and only get home to see them once every two months or
so. I think
that because we see them less frequently than my
husband’s family,
they should get first dibs on the holidays. I have a
huge family, and
am very close to all of them. But mother-in-law gets
mopey and weepy
when she can’t spend every holiday with us, and
manipulates us into
spending most of them with her. She’s already
“claimed” Thanksgiving,
and even wants us to spend religious holidays with
her, even though
my family is religious and his isn’t in the slightest.
We usually
spend Easter with his family, too, because neither of
us like the
long car drive (200 miles might not sound like a lot,
but we live in
a very heavily populated area of the mid-Atlantic,
that turns into a
traffic nightmare every damn day). And also, because
it’s easier to
just avoid breaking the news to his mother.

Christmas I refuse to cede. My birthday is the day
after, and because
I’m religious, it’s a very important time for me. Last
year we told
Mama-in-law we were driving to see my folks for the
Baby Jesus’s
birthday. She got teary and mopey as expected, and we
relented. We
ended up spending Christmas Eve with her, driving all
night to my
hometown, staying for less than 48 hours with my folks,
and then
driving back to spend Hubby’s birthday (two days after
Christmas)
with his parents, because neither Hub nor his mother
could stomach
the idea of spending it apart.

We’ve tried to work out a plan, like alternating
holidays. But that
makes me nervous because I have a lot of family
members in poor
health. What if this Christmas is Aunt Flo’s last?
Could I ever
forgive myself for missing it? Plus, I just want to be
able to spend
some quality time with my family. They’re great, and
we don’t get to
see them often, but we see Hubby’s at least five or
six days out of
the week. My family has invited Hubby’s to our holiday
functions. For
some reason, they don’t ever make it. My family is so
big that it’s
not easy for everyone to travel a great distance for
the holidays. I
don’t want to spend holidays without my husband,
especially because
we’re newlyweds. And won’t we EVER be able to have our
own
Christmases, Thanksgivings, et cetera? I feel like these
people own me.

Can you offer any advice for this? It’s really making
me resent his
family, and I don’t want to. They’re usually wonderful
people.

Homesick Bride

Dear Homesick,

If you don’t want to spend that much time with your in-laws, then…don’t.Sit your husband down and tell him exactly what you just told me, if you haven’t already.Figure out a compromise, whether it’s that you split holidays or that you limit your in-law time to two nights a week or that sometimes he goes over there on his own, whatever.But if you want to spend time on your own or with your own family, do it.

Your mother-in-law pulls the guilt trip because it works.Stop enabling her.If you couldn’t make it over for dinner, tell her that you had other plans, decline to elaborate on them, and change the subject.If you decide to spend Christmas with your family, tell her so, tell her you’ll miss her and you’ll see her soon, decline to elaborate, and change the subject.You don’t have to act mean, but you do have to stop playing the game.

I understand that you work with the woman and that you don’t want her to get upset, but it’s really not reasonable for her to expect to spend quite so much time with her grown son and his wife, who has her own family; if she can’t get her head around the way things work when adults get married and have their own lives, it’s pretty much her own problem.Give her the time you can; if she wants to pitch a fit because you can’t give her more, let her.

Dear Sars,

So there’s this boy. C and I started dating when he was a sophomore and
I was a senior (in high school). Things were great. I went off to
college without really talking to him about what was going to happen
when I got there, which was a mistake. Things fizzled, and when I got
back for winter break, I realized it was over. I dealt.

Sophomore year in college, I was dealing with the breakup of a
fuckbuddy relationship gone horribly wrong. C contacted me shortly
before the thing imploded. We talked over the next few weeks, I
complained about a lot of things, he sympathized. He told me he missed
me. I melted.

We hooked up over spring break, and it was great. He was really
sensitive and attentive, which I needed — fuckbuddy implosion aside,
I’d had a really bad quarter.Then the summer came, and I went off to
another city to work at a theatre. We talked online sometimes. The big
problem was that I had (sing it with me) fallen in love again. Finally
I told him, and he promised things weren’t going to get weird since
he’d known for quite some time (I’m the least subtle person in the
universe). He didn’t love me back, but I was willing to settle for the
way things had been going — hanging out, a little fooling around. I’m
easy to please.

I didn’t get that, of course. When I got back, C had changed. A lot. He
was argumentative, easily irritated, and not at all interested in
fooling around — in fact, at times it seemed he was deliberately
avoiding physical contact. I talked to him about the way he was acting.
Ah, “It’s Not You, It’s Me.” We meet again. I’ve seen a few glimpses of
the person he was just three months ago — the person who held me and
told me I was beautiful and put up with my crap when my head was
falling apart, the person I love — but it hasn’t been enough.

Now, C has been ill since January with some kind of stomach ailment
that’s made him lose thirty or forty pounds. It causes him discomfort
and sometimes outright pain, which could explain a lot about his
behavior. And I know that he has psychological problems — I do too, in
spades. I don’t think he’s being an asshat on purpose. However, he is
being an asshat, and that’s the point.

Sars, I’m tired. I’m tired of hoping he’ll change back, I’m tired of
getting jackshit from him when I ask for so little, and I’m tired of
trying to deal with his crap. The problem is, I really do not want to
have The Breakup Talk. There is nothing left here that even resembles a
relationship — just me and my hurt feelings. Breaking it off just
seems ludicrous and unnecessary. I’d rather just go back to school, get
a haircut, listen to some angry music and let my feelings for him die a
natural death. I cry easily, and I really don’t want to cry about this
in front of C (which I totally would) — I really don’t think it’s
worth the humiliation. I’m just sick of the heartache, and I don’t want
to have to go see him and talk to him about this stuff. I want to stop
thinking about it, like, NOW.Still…part of me says that I need to
have it out with him, make a clean break of things, blah blah blah
closure-cakes.

I don’t know which of my instincts to trust, frankly. Do you think that
breakups always need The Breakup Talk? Is there anything to be gained
by telling C that he’s been acting badly? Am I right in wanting to skip
the aggro, or am I just being a coward?

If you think I should do The Breakup Talk, I’ll suck it up and do it.
I’m just not sure it will do either of us any good.

Thanks,
Can I Just Say “Asshat” And Leave?

Dear Sure, If You Want,

It’s probably obvious to you both that it’s over — but I still think you should have The Breakup Talk, crying and all, because I think you need to let him see that he’s hurt you, and more to the point, I think you need to let yourself be hurt in front of him, if that makes any sense.

It’s going to suck, obviously, but moving on from him is going to suck no matter which way you slice it.The Breakup Talk closes the door on it more tightly, though, and you’ll hate it and you’ll cringe every time you think about it, but that’s not a bad thing.You have nothing to lose by telling him to his face that he had the power to hurt you and that he did just that and he can go to hell, boom!You just threw a dish, that’s right.Fuck you for not caring about me.Fuck me for caring about you.Fuck this.Fuck off.

Take it from someone who taught at The School Of Don’t Let Them Know They Broke You — it doesn’t help.Scream and cry and call him a dickbat.Get it out.Let him carry it too.You’ll feel better about it in the long run knowing that you told him exactly what’s what.

Hey Sars,

A housemate etiquette question. Background: I am female, and live with two
other girl housemates — let’s call them “Newbie” and “Fitz.” Newbie has
recently moved in, Fitz was in the house first, and I’ve lived with Fitz
(and someone else) for about a year before Newbie arrived. Newbie seems
nice, as far as you can tell this early on.

The issue is as follows. Newbie gets around a bit with the boys. No
problems with that here — seize the day, et cetera. Where I’m less enthused is
that she seems to be quite happy with giving out our house phone-number
with a fair amount of abandon. A couple of times when I’ve answered the
phone, guys are seem to be after her but don’t know her name — and a few
times, I’ve taken down a message and she’s looked at it blankly and said,
“Who? Oh, that’s right — that guy from the bar last night.” To give an
approximation of the frequency, this has happened five times in the last three
or four weeks (and these would be times I’m sure this is the case, and have
answered the phone, or she’s told me about it directly).So it’s frequent
enough to be a pattern, but not that frequent.

However, this makes me nervous for a few reasons. I’ve had a previous
experience with a phone stalker — I wasn’t directly the victim, but it was
sufficiently bad to make me a bit paranoid about who has our number. Maybe
not paranoid — but the idea that this number is going out all over the
place is not something I’m ecstatic about. I know she has a mobile phone. I
would feel a lot more comfortable if she was giving that out to people she
didn’t know well, instead of our home phone number.

What I really want to know if is this gripe of mine is fair. Am I just
trying to inflict my house rules or standards on everyone else? This is not
something Fitz and I have ever discussed, simply because it’s never come
up in the way we deal with friends/acquaintances. A further concern — I
don’t want Newbie to feel awkward about me, and I really don’t want to give
the impression that I’m morally conservative, et cetera (she can do what or whom
she likes as far as I’m concerned — and she’s only brought one guy home
with her so far, which demonstrates that she has a vetting procedure before
anyone crosses the threshold. It’s the phone calls that’s the worry).

So should I do anything? Should I wait until I’m more sure this is a
pattern/likely to be an ongoing concern?And if I say something, how
should I say it? I want to feel comfortable and happy at home, but I also
don’t want to be the housemate from hell.

Lyn

Dear Lyn,

If you’ve had a previous experience with a phone stalker, I don’t think it’s out of bounds for you to ask Newbie to give out her mobile number to strangers instead — just explain that it’s a safety issue and that you’d feel a lot more comfortable if the house line only went out to friends and family.You don’t even have to bring up the specific call circumstances that have you worried; I think she’ll understand.

But if you still worry that it’s a little over the top, run it by Fitz first and see what she thinks about making it a general house rule — i.e. if any of the three of you gives out contact information, stick to mobiles and email, or get their contact info, but don’t give out the house number.

But I don’t think it’s a big deal, or judgmental of Newbie’s lifestyle, to ask if she’d mind keeping the house number more private.It doesn’t really inconvenience her, so go for it, I say.

[10/31/03]

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