I’ve made
out with Snow White. Granted, she wasn’t
in costume when the kissing occurred.
That would be too good a story to wait this long to tell. No, she was dressed just like the rest of us,
but I know she played Snow White at Disneyland and
that’s all I need. I also realize that
it doesn’t really go along with the theme of these posts to brag, but can you
blame me for taking the rare opportunity when it comes? Don’t worry, this is as much a story about
lost opportunities as all the rest, I just thought for once I would lead with a
bright spot. The fact of the matter is,
fairy tale princess or not, I have a hard time understanding women. I never seem to read the signs right, even
when the signs are words spelling out exactly what I should do. And as great as getting a kiss from a Disney
icon may be, the confusion about what happens after is what leaves the
mark.
In college,
I was a member of a fraternity. It
wasn’t really something I was expecting; Greek life wasn’t something I felt was
necessary to the college experience, it was just something that happened. I’ve seen the movies and heard the stories,
and I’ve never really felt that living through a series of humiliating,
painful, and sometimes disgusting exercises is the way to form bonds with other
guys. I would much rather bond sitting
around the dorm sharing a few beers and a ton of laughs. That is what the fraternity I joined was all
about. I didn’t even know I was
rushing. A bunch of friends were asked
to go bowling with a group of guys, we all went and before we knew it we were
in a fraternity. There was no nudity,
spanking, forced drinking, or sheep involved; this fraternity was hazing
free. The first year I joined the guys
all decided to head to Rosarito, Mexico,
for a fraternity formal. The thought
was, if we held the formal in Mexico
everyone would be able to drink since the legal drinking age is 18. It was going to be two nights and three days
of nothing but drunken debauchery.
A few weeks
prior to the trip a bunch of us got together to break a series of school
rules. I would like to say it was a
weekend night, but who knows at this point.
I didn’t really have any problem partying on weeknights. It’s probably one of the reasons it took me
more then 15 years to get a Batchelor’s Degree.
The school we went to was supposed to be alcohol free, the dorms were
single sex with curfews and it was illegal to climb through windows. On this night, me and a couple of friends
found ourselves playing cards and drinking seven and seven’s in a girl’s dorm
with a few other girls. Lucky for us it
was a first floor room, because when we went to leave drunk after curfew we
just exited through the window. One of
those girls was Snow White and there was sparks between us right from the get
go. I don’t say that because I felt the
sparks, in all honesty I wasn’t all that attracted to her at first glance, she
had to grow on me, I say that because she told me so. Unlike the demure princess depicted in the
movies, this Snow was easily the most forward girl I’ve ever had dealings with,
and as I’ve made clear in previous stories, that’s exactly what I need. She spent the night making it very clear that
she was attracted to me and would like to get to know me better, and although I
was a little intimidated by her brashness, who was I to turn away a girl.
The problem
with the whole scenario was that Snow was going to Rosarito with us. This fact excited her, a chance to hang out with
me, but it was less then perfect from my point of view. For a girl to be going to Rosarito she would
have to have been invited by someone in the fraternity and I hadn’t invited
her. It just so happened that another guy
in the fraternity had the hots for Snow and asked her to go with him. She didn’t have any romantic hopes and said
yes as a friend. There are many themes
and common occurrences that will show up in these stories, one of them seems to
be me moving in on girls who friends of mine have a thing for. As much as I liked the thought of furthering
things with Snow, seeing where she wanted to take things, figuring out if there
was life after Sara, I wasn’t excited about starting my career in the
fraternity stealing a brother’s date in Mexico.
Of course
with someone like Snow whatever concerns I may have aren’t going to get in the
way of her accomplishing what she has set out for. She felt it was very clear that she was going
just as a friend and was free to do whatever she wanted with whomever she
wished. We all made our own way to Mexico,
checked into the hotel, dropped our stuff in the room and ran to the bars. The first bar was kind of a bust, so after a
few drinks we moved on to what looked like a more popular bar with a line out
front. Snow and a few other friends were
at the end of the line so we all waited together. We instantly started talking and flirting
pretty heavily. She kept talking about
what we should do tonight or tomorrow and I kept pointing out that she was
there with Carl, not me.
“Okay,
fine. When we get back to school you’re
going to take me out to dinner,” was her reply.
“And what
makes you think that’s going to happen?”
“Because I
do. I can tell. You’re going to ask me to a nice dinner.”
The rest of
the night was kind of a blur. There was
lots of Tequila, Long Island Ice Teas, and beer. Nothing happened, yet it was clear something
was building between us. When we got
back to our room I laid the whole story out to the guy and girl I was rooming
with and asked what I should do. My
roommate assured me that I was looking too deeply into things. “That’s just how she is and she’s here with
Carl. She doesn’t want anything to
happen with you.” And yet another theme
reared its head.
The next
night was the formal and when that was over we all ended up at a bar right next
to the hotel. We were once again
drinking silly amounts of hard liquor and having a great time when Snow showed
up obviously upset and more than willing to catch up with everyone else’s level
of drunkenness. She had gotten into an
argument with Carl, who thought she wasn’t spending enough time with him and
wasn’t as clear about the situation as Snow had thought. The thing about alcohol is that it tends to
ruin your judgment, so after more then a few Tequila shots I found myself on
the dance floor dancing rather closely with Snow. Those who know me now realize how drunk we
all were because the phrase “found myself on the dance floor” is not ever used
in my normal life. When the song
finished up Snow grabbed my hand and pulled me outside. We sat on a short brick wall and were having
what I’m sure was a silly drunk conversation when she suddenly got up ran to
some near by bushes and emptied her stomach.
Now, this
is probably where the night should have ended, but it didn’t. She came back over and made some comment about
ruining her chance to kiss me. I was so
drunk that I took this as an invitation and leaned in for the kiss she was
asking for. I thought nothing of the
fact she had just thrown up at the time.
I mean, I had spent 8 months of my life throwing up right before I made
out with my girlfriend. The big
difference I guess was that I brushed my teeth thoroughly before kissing her,
but again I was really drunk this time and there was a willing girl sitting
right in front of me. In all honesty, it
sounds grosser then it really was. I
didn’t taste anything. It was a very
pleasant kiss and I was hoping for things to get heavier but instead I walked
her back to her room and called it a night.
When we got
back to school I headed over to her room to check in on where we stood. I wanted to clear up whether the kiss we
shared was a drunken mistake or the start of something more. I don’t really remember the details of what
was said or how it played out but she said she wanted to take me to Disneyland
before I left for the east coast (there was less than a month of school left)
and when we both got up for me to leave, I pulled her in and kissed her
properly, ie, no vomit or alcohol involved.
That’s
where the relationship ended. You might
have been expecting more. So was I. We met up at the café for a couple meals and
stressed that we were going to go to Disneyland, but
nothing more happened. I called her room
a week or two later because there was only one weekend left in the school year
to set plans for our “date” and her roommate informed me that she had finished
up early and had already headed home. I
was crushed and confused and adamant that if she wasn’t considerate enough to
tell me herself that she was leaving that I didn’t want anything more to do
with her. Of course we ran into each
other many times over the years, she was close friends with some of my good
friends, but it was always weird and awkward.
One time, after we had all left college, a bunch of us got together to
celebrate a friend’s birthday and she showed up with her boyfriend. At one point in the night I started to tell a
Rosarito story and she flipped out trying to signal me to stop. She thought I was going to talk about us
making out.
An
interesting post scrip to this story that really only makes the whole thing
that more confusing is that she sent me one of the sweetest e-mails I have ever
received. She told me that she took my
address from a mutual friend and built up the courage to write me, that she
didn’t know where I was or what I was up to but that she still remembered the
kiss in her dorm, that it was one of her fondest college memories and that she
would have to catch up with me from our friend.
Not being a total idiot, I replied and filled her in on what I was up to
and saying we should get together. She
wrote back saying she was teaching in Pasadena
(I think) and that things were going good and that yes we should hang out but
she had a busy schedule. She never
mentioned a boyfriend or husband. I
never asked. And after that I never
heard from her again.
I’m
not sure what the moral of this story is other then fairytale Princesses are
just as messed up as the rest of the girls I date. I don’t know that I really learned anything
from it other than girls don’t make sense.
They say one thing and then do something else and it confuses the hell
out of me. If you don’t want to go to Disneyland,
don’t bring it up in the first place. If
you don’t want to meet up don’t send the e-mail wanting to catch up. If you don’t want the relationship don’t keep
leading the person on. But that’s not
much of a lesson. As a guy that should
all be a given. I think I really just
told the story so I could write the phrase, I’ve made out with Snow White. Mission accomplished!
