The Virginity Project

The Sunday Sermon OR why you should try, even when you don't know what you're doing.

It’s a truly great day for The Virginity Project because in under one month, ‘Losing It: How we popped our cherry over the last 80 years’ will be published in the USA. Needless to say, that also makes it a great day for me, Kate Monro.

Full disclosure: I never had plans to write a book. I never had plans for anything much beyond having a good time and going to a lot of parties for most of my teens and twenties. It wasn’t until I hit my thirties that it occurred to me that 1. I might be good at something else and 2. I better find out what this elusive ‘something’ was because time wasn’t standing still.

Without wanting to pen a CV of my entire working life, I’d done a lot of ‘interesting’ jobs up to that point (mixed with a bunch of pointless ones it must be said). I’d worked in the music business way back when, assisting maligned Blur manager Mike Collins as his handsome young tykes recorded their first album (caveat: a tear trickled down my face as I watched them at Hyde Park, almost 20 years later in 2009. Who knew this ‘indie’ band would play to 50,000 people in the heart of London one day? I always loved Blur but I admit I hadn’t foreseen that). Later, I worked with some of the most talented photographers, stylists, writers and artists during my tenure at Dazed & Confused Magazine. I was always drawn to creative spirits but only ever in the capacity of assistant or marketer. It was too much to dare think that I might create something of my own. Instead, I aligned myself with bright clever people, got the kind of jobs that people said were ‘amazing’ and hoped that something might rub off.

To anyone who has ever considered doing something vaguely creative, I have one piece of advice for you: start doing it. It doesn’t matter how shit it is. Every mediocre, good or even great piece of art began with one tentative stroke of a brush, a clumsy collection of words and someone who had absolutely no idea what they were doing. There is no short cut so let me save you the time because for the longest stretch, I genuinely believed, albeit in a subconscious manner (the worst kind!) that any worthwhile creative endeavour appeared on the page as a fully formed idea and if you couldn’t think of something show-stopping and spew it up as a perfectly conceived piece of art immediately then you weren’t that creative. I couldn’t be more wrong. Creativity is a process. It is also the net result of graft.

Those fabulous fashion stylists I used to work with at Dazed? Their work took weeks of preparation mixed with large doses of spontaneity and creative risk on the day of a shoot.  For the longest time, I preferred to believe that they possessed something that I didn’t. Don’t get me wrong. We all have an aptitude for something. I wouldn’t make a great fashion stylist but it turns out that I’m pretty good at collecting people’s stories and curating them into intriguing social documents. Again, who knew?

Along the way, I had to learn to string a sentence together. It wasn’t always comfortable. Pressing the ‘send’ button on my blog for the first time was a bit like the literary equivalent of passing your driving test and not knowing whether you’re about to take out ten pedestrians on your inaugural drive. I’m being dramatic but it was unchartered territory and this is what I’m getting at. You have to keep trying, even if your output isn’t that impressive. Creativity is a small act of personal bravery, nothing more. Setting out and not knowing what direction you’re going to travel in is perplexing. What drove me forward was the belief that I had something to say. I still don’t write on a regular enough basis to be great. But I’m ok with that. I’m half way through my life - god (with a small g) willing - and optimistic enough to feel that the best is ahead of me. But in the meantime, I can be cock-a-hoop about the fact that a book that I never anticipated writing about a subject that has resonance with most people will be published in America. This is way beyond the expectations I had for myself.

Another small but not insignificant detail, along the way, one gets ‘the signs’. The seemingly random quips or comments from friends or even virtual strangers that spur you on…the friend that emailed me apropos of nothing one day with ‘one day Kate, you are going to find something that you like doing and you are going to be really good at it’. That surprised me. That he saw something that I only mildly suspected. The intern who included me in a round robin creative challenge and mailed me back a few days later with ‘your contribution was by far the most imaginative’ - total shock on my part - to the boyfriend who constantly chided me for ‘being creative but not doing anything about it’. Take note of this shit and use it to push yourself forward. It isn’t just ‘the universe’. It is people who recognise something tangible. From someone who flunked school, blew out university but got an A+ in wasting time, read the signs and make a promise to expect more of yourself.

I may well be preaching to the converted. The teenagers I encounter these days are far more self possessed and expectant than I was at that age. Possibly because they didn’t grow up with parents who remember rationing and The Second World War (‘when we were young we ate whatever we could get so EAT IT’ was the soundtrack for anyone who grew up in the last part of the 20th century). Today’s storyteller grew up with a different soundtrack. For the younger amongst you, picture ‘Mouse’ from ‘The Carrie Diaries’. Bright, of Chinese American heritage and holding the expectations of parents who have given up everything in their lives to make hers better and draped those expectations across their daughter’s slender shoulders. I would not have lasted 2 minutes in this household. On the other hand, I might have written my first book a bit quicker (but with much less entertainment along the way).

'I'm Mei. I was born in 1991, in China. I am Chinese American. That means I grew up with strict parents, perfect grades, and not surprisingly, a very conservative view on sex, alcohol, drugs, and the like. When I was in 4th grade, a friend wrote me a note explaining the health processes related to puberty and sex. Apparently, her mother had given her ‘the talk,’ and you know little girls…they're eager to share. When I approached my mother about it, she told me that it was all a lie. It wasn't till middle school that I really found out about the whole she-bang: kissing, French kissing, groping, SEX.

I went through most of my high school years without having even a kissed a boy, which wasn't for lack of wanting. I just wasn't allowed to have boyfriends. You wonder why I didn't go behind my parents' backs, but this wasn't just a rule...this was The Rule. For Chinese parents, a boyfriend means distractions which mean bad grades (like B's). There is no influence more evil than Boyfriends.

But at the end of junior year, an Asian boy from Canada transferred into my school. We met, and in a few months, I was in love. After weeks of coercing, begging, nagging, and making absurd promises about studying hard, my mother miraculously allowed us to date. Maybe she saw how desperate I was for this boy.

We dated for two and a half years. For the first year, we were in total, loving bliss. Senior year was one of the best years of my life (so far, at least). I got my first kiss, my first make-out session, my first grope…the only thing we never did was make love.

I had always been taught to save my virginity for marriage, but honestly, I didn't care too much about the whole save-yourself bullshit. I was 18, and I had grown pretty tired of my parents constantly roping me down with stupid Chinese rules. If Wai had wanted it, I would have made love to him. And that's the thing; it would really have been making love because at the time, we were completely right for each other.

But he was much more Chinese (and Christian) than I was. He was a virgin and planned to stay that way until marriage. In fact, he wanted to marry a virgin. He said he couldn't possibly marry a girl who had already had sex with someone else. I was pretty disappointed inside when I found this out, but I loved him and respected him, so I let it go.

After senior year, I left for college across the country in California. We somehow stayed together for another year and a half, long distance. Wai was very straight-edged, and out of fear that he would leave me, I stayed away from those freshmen beers, weed, and parties. We chatted every night, and saw each other during breaks. I would wonder sometimes if I were missing out on other people and new experiences but I really believed that I couldn't get anything better.

Things changed my sophomore year. I started rock climbing and I met the most incredible group of people. They are my closest friends now. In that group was a boy, Jamie. We were incredibly comfortable with each other from the moment we met, and our group of friends was amazing. I began to question my lifestyle. Yes, I had been brought up to stay away from drugs and alcohol and sex, and yes, my boyfriend would flip a shit/break up with me if I did any of it, but I really wanted to experience all of it. More than anything, I wanted to experience it with my rock climbing friends. I knew I could trust them. And...I wanted to keep seeing Jamie.

I started going out regularly with my friends, to drink and smoke and hang out, to just be a college student. I talked to Wai less and to Jamie more and predictably, Wai and I started to have problems. After being asked why I wasn't ashamed of the way I was living, I broke up with Wai. 

I immediately started to date Jamie. Maybe that was callous, but we gravitated toward each other. He was everything that my old life was not. He smoked and drank, and didn't think any of it was a big deal. He was the most hilarious person I'd ever met, and was completely solid in who he was. He was happy, thought that other people should be happy, and didn't believe in controlling what other people did. He was everything that I wanted to leave behind….all the suffocating rules and guidelines that would keep me ‘pure.’ All that my parents and Wai stood for.

After we had dated for two weeks, I decided to have sex with Jamie. Thinking back on it now, I wanted something to erase all the stiffness and Chinese-ness that had defined my life for 19 years. It wasn't because I genuinely wanted sex, or because I was in love with Jamie (although, we liked each other quite a lot); I thought losing my virginity would be some kind of fresh start, symbolic of all the ways I had started to change.

Surprisingly, Jamie was also a virgin. We didn't really know what we were doing, I was tense and nervous, and it hurt like hell. We didn't get much of him into me, and I didn't really know if that counted as losing my virginity. After a few failed attempts, we gave up. That night, I lay in his bed, sore and frustrated, wondering what I was doing. If I was this tense, I probably wasn't ready to be having sex. Maybe my parents and Wai were right. Luckily, Jamie was incredibly sweet and understanding about it. He knew I had just gotten out of a serious relationship, and to him, the sex wasn't that big of a deal. It was about what I wanted, about being happy.

We stayed together, and spent many days and nights just enjoying each other’s company. Then one night, when we were fooling around, I realized that I really did want Jamie. All of him. The thought caught me off guard, but I knew then that this was how it should be. I was going to lose my virginity unplanned, without any rules or guidelines to restrict me, and that was completely right. I was much less tense, we went slowly, and this time, we succeeded. I remember looking into Jamie's eyes as he came in me, and thinking I had never been more happy about a decision. I had never felt so good. Before, I had been afraid that my parents and Wai might turn out to be right, that I would regret losing my virginity so...casually, but I knew then they were wrong. It's not about the rules, about using sex to seal some marriage contract. It's about what feels right, and being with Jamie felt right.

Jamie and I are still together. We have a lot of sex and we love it. I am so happy about my decision to sleep with him that it's like I have negative regret - it's made me feel better about other decisions I've made in my life to bring me here. There's something physically and emotionally free about being with him. Losing my virginity (and I guess he lost his to me) has come to represent my liberation from the fear and timid-ness that my parents and Wai had instilled in me. I'm not that much more wild than before (although I do drink and take a few hits now and then), but I am happier. And I have no regrets about my first time. I can't ask for more.'

Anxiety, cars and books we never meant to write...

I’m always slightly irritated by people who begin their blog posts with the words ‘sorry I haven’t updated my blog lately but I’ve been really busy with life/work/Christmas shopping etc….and yet I feel tempted to justify my absence in precisely the same way today. The Virginity Project has not worked this hard since 2007. No particular reason. The day job just got between me and my ability to sit down and write something.

Now, at last, alongside the rest of the world, the pace is slowing as we settle into the shortest days of the year, hunker down and spend time with family and friends. I never really think of myself as a writer, more of a sharer of ideas but for today’s purposes, I’ll refer to myself as one. Any writer will tell you that the battle to sit down and write is a constant one. People imagine that writers make an appointment with the muse, sharpen a pencil and out come perfectly composed prose. If only. There is no mystery or alchemy to the process…(except for an exceptionally gifted and quite possibly tortured few). You put the man-hours in at the coal-face and hope that the words come out interesting. If they don’t, you get over yourself and stay there until they do.

Today, I’d like to bang out something about my Renault 5, a car that has travelled many miles with me, physical and otherwise over the last 10 years. I didn’t learn to drive until I was in my thirties. ‘Don’t leave it too late’ said my friend Charlotte. ‘Its harder to learn when you’re older’. Yeah right, I thought. As if that could be true. Turns out it was. It took me at least 18 months of lessons to get past the fact that I was driving a hulking lump of metal/potential killing machine. I honestly couldn’t believe that anyone would put me in charge of a car.

My reasons for learning to drive were unusual as well. I’d had a testing experience in my early 30’s. I had what could only be described as a 3-month anxiety attack. I was horrified by this experience and when it abated, I didn’t want to talk about it…with my friends, with my family, or, as most sensible people would do, with a therapist. I didn’t want to re-live a single second of this episode so I decided I would learn to drive instead.

I had little interest in actually owning a car or the usefulness of being able to get from A to B without walking. I just wanted to do something that would help my head. I thought of it as a physical therapy. Something that might make me more confident or assertive and that was all. What I never banked on was that driving would be such a pleasure, such an adventure and so much fun. Once I passed the test that is. It took me 3 go’s. I cracked it on the final attempt, mostly because I’d bought the Renault and I wanted to drive it.

My chickens really came home to roost when I was let loose on the streets of London by myself. My jaw was almost wired together in those early days; so intense was the combination of excitement and terror. Progress felt slow. Remember those friends who tell you ‘oh, you’ll get to that stage where you drive home and you can’t remember how you got there’. Really? Is there a chance that might happen in the next fifteen years? There are so many firsts when you begin to drive by yourself…your first motor way, your first trip round the Hammersmith one way system (not unlike a cartoon character careering towards Niagra Falls in a barrel. At least that’s how it felt) and yet somehow, just as I suspected, I found out exactly who I was behind the wheel of my car.

Not long after, apropos of nothing except an increased sense of self, I decided to write a book and the car came with me on my trips to interview people. Most memorably, all the way to Lands End and back to interview a tantric sex teacher. I never felt alone. I had my little red car. I’ve slept in it, laughed in it and spent hours singing, cacooned in the tiny universe that is one’s car when one is going on a long journey.

I shed hot stingy tears when I sold it this last weekend. It is hard to say good-bye but I’m excited about the future. I’m excited about new cars and the adventures I’m going to have in them. I’m thankful for the experiences: the good, the bad and the ugly. I’ve always tried to see the plus side of any situation, even a shitty one. I never wanted to encounter ill mental health but ultimately, it pushed me onto a path that has been more full of adventure – and joy - than I ever could have imagined. I’m talking less about driving now and more about the writing of books, blogs and the receiving of emails from people who take the time to write their stories and share them here on The Virginity Project with everyone else. I never, ever planned on writing about virginity loss in a million years (or Big Guys With Small Dogs for that matter) and yet, here we are. I wish you adventures, happiness and joy in 2013, and most of all, the ability to eek the positive out of any situation you find yourself in. You never know where you might end up as a result.

Today’s story-teller titles her story to me ‘24 year old with a virgin slut complex’. The truth is, the complex belongs entirely to the people she meets. She is utterly normal and well adjusted. Its just everyone else that can’t deal with her virgin status.

‘Hello there, I have a story to tell.....I'm a 24-year-old female living in NYC and I'm a virgin. I have no strong religious views that prompt me to abstain from sex and I am not asexual or closeted homosexual. But these are the things people assume when I tell them about my life without sex. Aside from the closed minded people who make these assumptions there are the ones who believe I'm lying. Even my own doctor implied that I was either lying or a lesbian after hearing that I was not sexually active and so I have stopped telling people that I am a virgin to avoid these familiar questions and doubts about my virginity. I omit the fact that I am a virgin on a daily basis and have grown very accustomed to lying about it.

The first time I lied was in high school but that was only because I was afraid people would not be surprised due to my nerdy and unattractive appearance. Since then I have blossomed socially and physically. I lie now to avoid uncomfortable situations for myself and the people around me (its funny how uncomfortable people become when the subject of virginity comes about....assuming they believe you). I really feel like a child most of the time and try to hide these feelings in my everyday life but it is becoming very hard.

Dating is very difficult for me. Finding men my own age that are patient enough to deal with me is near impossible. According to most men I meet I ‘scream sex’ so it is obvious men are very attracted to me and seem to want to bed me all the time - but this always changes upon me telling them about my situation.

After I tell them that I have never had sex they either lose interest or become obsessed with the idea of taking my virginity. In fact the man I am dating right now has done nothing but pressure me since he found out i was a virgin. With all the chances I have had to get it over with I just don't want to yet.....I enjoy physical closeness. I know that I am a sexual being but I haven't found the right person to share this moment with and at the rate I'm going will never find anyone to share this with. Am I unusual? And how can I be proactive about finding that special someone who wants me for something other than just a weird sexual fantasy?’ 

I was tidying up the hard drive on my laptop the other day, as one is wont to do at this time of year, when I came across a document I had completely forgotten about. I had titled it ‘the virgin diaries’ and it is a diary that begins right after I first had the idea for my book. Back when this blog wasn’t even a twinkle in my eye.

For some reason, and as you will see, I had got it into my head that I couldn’t tell a single living soul about my book writing plans at work. Because otherwise they would sack me. They wouldn’t, but try telling me that at the time. I was quite possessed by my idea and nothing, but nothing was going to stand in my way. Ironic really that just as I had the idea for my book, my bosses asked me to manage the office move. For anyone who’s ever moved an office full of people from one location in London to another, you will be feeling my pain right now. Somehow though, in between juggling floor plans, handymen and contracts, I managed to source my first interviewees, experience all sorts of self-doubt and drive to Cornwall to interview the brilliant 93-year-old Edna. 

I’d also forgotten what a major challenge it was to step out of my comfort zone and do my own thing for the first time. It’s a brilliant reminder, at a prescient time of the year, that the best things we do are often the biggest leaps of faith. I had never written a book before. I had no idea what I was doing but I felt compelled to try all the same.

The story starts a few weeks after I have first had ‘the big idea’.

30 Sept 2005

My bosses are making noises about moving offices. If we do, I will be project managing the move. You have to laugh.  I am 37 years old and I have just discovered what it is that I want to do with my life and my bosses want me to put it on hold and move office.  Of course that is pure conjecture, they know nothing of my plans to write a book and my job is my job and must be done.  I just don’t want to hold back at this stage. I am on the cusp of committing myself to something in a way I never have done before. I know that deep down; nothing will stop me if I really want to do it.

17 Jan 2006

Crikey, I have got such a bee in my bonnet. Having had to stop work on the book for 6 weeks while I project managed the office move, and now starting up again…I’ve got a fire in me and it’s burning me up!

During the move I found time to sew little seeds here and there. Phone calls, emails, the odd dinner with someone I thought would make a good ‘connector’*, so that when I had finished with the move to St John Street, I would have laid some solid ground work for the next phase. And I have. But people saying they want to take part and actually doing it are two different things. It’s not like I’m asking them to discuss their favourite foods, I’m asking them to share some of the most intimate memories of their lives. So I have to go at their pace. I am an Aries and this pace doesn’t suit me.

I get an overwhelming feeling sometimes – there is so much to do – that I don’t know which way to turn first.  What about all the Muslims I need to talk to, the Jewish people, Buddhists and Sikhs.  There are 1.8 million Muslims living in Great Britain today and I need to speak to at least ten of them.  I find myself standing in the queue at the post office in Farringdon, looking at the girls behind the counters in their headscarves and seriously considering slipping a synopsis of my book along with my cash and asking them to please call me when they have read it.  Would they think I was weird?

*I began sourcing my interviewees via friend’s networks and some of them were incredibly adept (not to mention helpful) at fixing me up with interesting people to talk to. I came to think of these people as ‘connectors’.

24 Jan 2006

Bonus! Just got a call from Nancy’s 19-year-old-babysitter.  She wants to be interviewed for my book and what’s more, so does her boyfriend.  She also has two other friends she can bring along as well.  I have to hold her at arms length for a moment here.  Two is enough I tell her, if there’s four of you it will take too long so come with your boyfriend and lets see how it goes.  I’m really pleased. But nervous.  More so than with the older interviewees and I don’t know why. Young people have been really hard to pin down.

27 Jan 2006

I hit the read symbol on my phone to read the text that has just popped up. It is from Nancy’s sitter. ‘Sorry Kate, I can’t do it, I just don’t feel comfortable with it, sorry to let you down’.  Bummer. Well at least she let me know.

1 Feb 2006

I went out for an ‘appraisal’ lunch with one of my bosses today. It’s just a catch up and we go to the Souvlaki bar in St John Street.  I love it. The smell of chargrilled meat that hits you as you walk in is completely fabulous.

We chatted about work for a bit. On the back of the successful office move they have offered me a new role. And then he catches me off guard with something that he has asked before.  ‘But what is it that you really want to do Kate?’

‘Well I think this new role will be great, a new direction within the company is just what I need’

‘No, what is it that you really, really want to do with your life Kate?’

I am dumbstruck by his perceptiveness and I struggle, not for the first time - but now for a different reason - for a reply.  I begin to wonder if he knows what I am doing outside of work.  I end up fumbling around for some half assed answer about always working within creative industries, getting frustrated and wanting to do something creative myself.

‘Well’, he says, ‘you better hurry up and do it, because you’ll be thirty, (I don’t remind him at this point that I am about to hit 38), you’ll be forty, you’ll be fifty even, and your life will be over’.

Again, I cannot think what to say. It almost kills me not to tell him, that I am working on something, that its taking up pretty much all of my brain space, that I think about little else, that I am, in fact, possessed.

But I can’t.  In that moment my mind winds forward and I wonder if I would be compromising my position further down the line even though – spookily - he assures me that if I were working on something outside of work, he wouldn’t mind, as long as I wasn’t coming to work and ‘falling asleep on my desk’.

Again, I wonder does he know? It wouldn’t be impossible for him to find out.  And I think, it’s a shame, because I know he would love the idea and I want to tell him.

7 Feb 2006

I am having one of those days.  I’ve been off sick from work and I just can’t muster up any enthusiasm about anything. It’s tricky riding the highs and lows sometimes when you’re doing your own thing for the first time.  If I don’t do something of a day to push this project along then nothing happens. It’s as simple as that.  A lot of times that is quite an exhilarating feeling and others, like today, I feel like a heavy leaden weight is in my brain…37 years of total inertia and all of a sudden I have woken up, had the guts to strike out on my own and not give a monkeys what anyone else thinks about it. It’s a big deal for me. 

On the up side, I spoke to a lovely lady called Sherrie.  She is 50; she loves the project and wants to get involved.  I also spoke to 93-year-old Edna, who I am going to Cornwall to interview on Friday. It was a good chat and I feel more confident about it now.

One of the things that I allowed to do my head in most of today is the frightening thought that I can’t write for peanuts.  I want to express myself better but sometimes it just won’t come out. I find myself writing in a way that I think makes me sound more intelligent instead of just letting it flow out more naturally. I spend so much time with my nose in a dictionary these days, hoping that some of the words rub off on me. It’s certainly not for lack of interest.

So, time to lock my inner Hitler away for the night, and hopefully for a bit longer than that.  That was spooky. When I typed Hitler in lower case, my Mac automatically changes him to a capital H Hitler. Crikey, even my Mac knows who Hitler is.

8 Feb 2006

My mum calls me to say that 93-year-old Edna rang her this morning and made murmurings about cancelling our trip and therefore, the interview.  I think she is worried that she is going to have to entertain us.  I am torn between that explanation and the thought that maybe she just has cold feet about opening her heart about her past.  She’s ninety-three years old for chrissakes, it’s amazing that she even agreed to it in the first place.  I tell myself that neither my mother nor myself have really communicated our plans clearly to her and that when she knows she only has to hang out with us for an hour or two each day she’ll feel better about it. The most crucial part of the whole weekend for me is the 30 minutes that she will talk into my Dictaphone about days gone by.  It’s a cornerstone of my project, a bookend, a vital component and I desperately want it.

Its tricky being an impatient type like myself. On the one hand its good because I do everything super fast, on the other its bad because I get cross when things don’t go my way.  It’s all very black and white for me.  I am learning as I get older to try and see the grey as well, or the rainbow shades as my boyfriend would prefer me to say.  To this end I am starting a six-week meditation course after my ski trip.  I am hoping to learn to ride the waves in a calmer manner.

I’m on tenterhooks about the ski trip, tenterhooks of happiness that is. Even though its one of the more strenuous sports you can partake in, I find it relaxing for the simple reason that it gives me a break from myself.  I don’t have time to think about the next 15 paces when I ski. I can but concentrate on the path immediately ahead of me and nothing else.

12 Feb 2006

Home and dry.  I clocked up a solid 8 hours behind the wheel of my Renault 5 today but it’s been worth every butt aching moment.  Edna gave a fabulous interview. She was by far the most succinct interviewee so far.  Not only that but she has an edgy sense of humour and is as sharp as a tack.  With most people I am mentally editing out the parts of the interview that I won’t need but with Edna I found myself thinking ‘how on earth am I going to edit this woman down, its ALL interesting’. 

Edna was married to Henry for sixty years.  That’s almost unfathomable to me.  Though I hardly remember him, I know that he was terrifically popular, kind and handsome. Everybody loved him. He was a bomber pilot in the Second World War. As he left for his nightly trips across the channel into Germany, Edna would count the planes out and then count them back in before the sun rose each morning.  It must have been hideously stressful for her.  He also suffered with nervous related illness for years after the war because, as Edna said, he was a sensitive man and he would return from his nightly trips across the channel into Germany, troubled by the thought that he may be responsible for the lives of women and children, albeit the enemy’s women and children but lives all the same.

*Edna was indeed a cornerstone of my project. Although I did interview an older lady of 101, it was Edna’s story that made the cut. Six years later, as The Virginity Project became a play, I watched Edna’s words come alive again and everybody loved listening to her.

24 Feb 2006

In between bouts of interviewing and my day job, I left for a ski trip in Italy and it appears, a momentary meltdown. I included this excerpt because, as I point out below, skiing is a brilliant metaphor for life. You do it the best when you lean away from the protection of the mountain. When it goes well, it is risk taking at its most elegant.

Skiing, it seems, is a lot like life. It bloody well has its ups and downs. The weather was vile today. The wind howled like a dog and snow swirled in great swathes around our feet as we attempted to attach our skis to our boots whilst remaining upright at the same time.

The snow, however, was perfect. Perfect enough for us to make our second attempt at a black run. Sure, I was apprehensive but our first foray into black run territory two days previous had been triumphant so I was brimming with confidence. Off we went, curling our way down into the unknown.

It is not necessary to look downwards on a steep slope. In fact to do so is stupid. To this end, I concentrated on moving across the slope and repeated the straightforward corner-turning instructions drummed into my head for the past four days. ‘This is OK’, I thought as we negotiated our way around the upper reaches of black run number 6.  ‘I may not be doing this with style and panache but I am doing it’. Down we went. Soft powdery snow, giving my skis something to carve into, something to hold me onto the side of the mountain. 

All of a sudden the snow texture changed.  My ski’s started making a different noise and I realised I was skiing on ice. On a black run. There was now nothing to grip me to what looked like a vertical drop beneath my skis.  I couldn’t remember anything that I had ever been taught about skiing. It was all gone.  My mind was a blank page and as I looked down, I realised that I was now sitting down on the slope, arms, skis and legs bent into an angular mess and pretty much as helpless as a new born calf. I struggled to my feet and dropped straight back down again. My mind made me do it. As I looked across to the edge of the slope, I could not contemplate, even for one second, attempting to stand up, moving to turn a corner, my skis facing downhill, closing the turn and surviving.  It did not seem possible. 

Michele, improbably, had moved from half way down the mountain to my side in a millisecond. ‘Kate, Kate, what is problem? You are good skier. Why? Why? You are not my problem. Henrietta’, he said, pointing rather uncharitably at my ski partner, ‘is my problem. Don’t worry. Michele is here. I will help you’.

I think he could see from my expression that I didn’t believe him so he took my arms and started speaking. To. Me. In. Single. Words.  ‘Flatten. Your. Skis. And. Slide. Down. With. Me’, he said.  Deep down in the dark recesses of my mind I could hear the words and slowly begin to action them. I did exactly as I was told and we slipped slowly down the mountain, the harsh scratch of our skis against the rigid icyness.

Suddenly we met the soft fluffy snow again and he sensibly pushed me upwards and commanded me to continue my journey down.  I hung onto every word he said.  Up, up, shoulder, shoulder, shoulder and back down, prepare, prepare, prepare and turn, shoulder down, hold it, hold it and BEND YOUR KNEES!!  My composure, like the colour in my face, slowly returned to life. The mountain began to look like a mountain again and not the torture chamber it had appeared to be just moments previously and I wondered to myself, what on earth happened there? Where did I go? Oh, here I am.

2 March 2006

One of those nuts days that you can’t believe will ever work out but somehow it does. I was working on our new press books all day, cutting, pasting, arranging, re-arranging, trying to make some visual sense of all the agency press. My boss is taking them to New York on Monday for an important meeting and she’s super stressed about it. Luckily she was out all day so I was left to my own devices, leaving me free to get away at 6pm sharp to get to an interviewee at 7.30 on the other side of London.

At 5.15pm my boss called me. ‘I’ll be back in the office in 15 minutes’. My heart sank. I know what this means.  By the time she has got here and got round to looking at the books it will be gone 6.  True to form, she arrived in a flurry, took a long phone call and then sat down for a catch up with someone. The clock ticked by and I was caught in a terrible dilemma.  If there is one thing I can’t bear, it’s the look on my bosses face when its after 6pm, she wants me to help her with something and I have someplace else to be, like, er, my life.  As predicted, when I told her I needed to leave at 6pm sharp she asked what I had to get to.

In my boss’s mind, it’s a simple request for information. I know she just wants to understand if it is something important.  But my ears hear ‘Kate, I am seriously questioning your commitment to this role, perhaps its time to start looking for a new job’.

Anyway I managed to leg it by 6.20 and made it to Teddington against all odds AND via a route I had never taken before, by 7.30 on the dot.

In a sea of ordinary looking houses, Sherrie’s stood out a mile. Hanging by the front door was a huge fluorescent heart.  I knocked and waited. I was way too tired to be even slightly nervous. Funny how some houses just seem to suck you in. As I stepped in and looked around I saw that Sherrie had created a labyrinth of a home that involved a lot of bare brick, candles, fairy lights, pets, books, music, food, television, all the things I like the most. I must have looked hungry because I was seated at a table eating an enormous bowl of pasta within two minutes of arriving.

Down to business and Sherrie told me a great story.  Like most stories worth telling, it had some fabulous highs and some wretched lows.  Once the tape stopped rolling, we continued talking as I knew we would. Frankly, if she had run me a bath and tucked me up in bed I would have gone along with it. She talked a lot of her and her husbands myriad ‘adopted son’s and daughter’s’*and I could see how they had amassed such a collection of interesting young people. She really loves the company of young people and because of her background, she is painfully aware of how tender and vulnerable young people are, more so, she thinks, today than at any other time in recent history.

*I joined Sherrie’s collection of adoptees that day and we’ve been friends ever since. I did however, test this friendship when I asked her to the stage version of my book and forgot to re-iterate to her that her story was actually in it. There is nothing quite like going to the theatre and seeing your own virginity loss story told as a monologue on stage. Good thing I always change names. Sorry Sherrie and thank you, once again, to all my wonderful, creative and generous interviewees and blog contributors - and of course my ex bosses. In the book or not, this project would not exist without you.

Truth, strange, fiction etc...

For anyone who ever planned on doing something new, something unprecedented (at least in your world), something you have nurtured as a dream and then thought, I can’t…in all likelihood, you probably can. If you had told me, just over six years ago that I would write a book, start a blog, start two blogs, get my book published – after many rejections – and then get that book made into a play, as I sat staring into the middle distance at my rather unfulfilling day job, I would have said you were a fantasist. But I started small and I kept going.

It helped that I was enthusiastic. When I first had the idea to interview people about virginity loss, I felt sure I was onto a winner. It wasn’t really ‘the moment’ I was interested in; it was The Story. Who were the characters involved? How did the plot build? And what inspires us to make such a big change in our lives? I set myself the task of interviewing as many different types of people as I could. Religious people, the older generation, those with physical disabilities, gay, straight, male and female, they were all fair game as far as I was concerned. I could barely get started fast enough. I worked my job during the day and snatched every spare moment I could to interview, cajole and extract the most diverse selection of stories that I could get out of people by night.

A year later, I got my first bite of the cherry when the sister of a friend set me up a meeting with Virago Publishing. She sent some of my stories ahead, they liked them and I was in. I had very little comprehension of just how important Lennie Goodings was as I climbed the stairs to her book filled office but that probably helped. I wasn’t overwhelmed. I took the experience in my stride. She was utterly charming. In the end, it didn’t lead to anything but ironically, it changed everything. The fact that Lennie Goodings was interested enough to look at my collection of stories was enough, in turn, for other people to be interested in me. By Christmas I had myself a bona fide literary agent and my dream was becoming increasingly real.

The next part of the journey was interesting….and harsh at the same time. My agent sent my book out on submission and it was roundly rejected. Looking back, this experience was the making of me. This was the moment when I toughened up and realised that if you really want to do something, be prepared to deal with disappointment. If at first you don’t succeed, cry by all means but for goodness sakes, don’t take it personally. Stand up, brush yourself off and keep moving forward. Every single cliché in the book was true. Rejection is part of the process. Deal with it. I didn’t find this experience easy though. I was like a bruised peach in those days. I’d just broken up with my boyfriend too, the one person who had encouraged me every step of the way. Without him by my side and a stack of rejection letters on the other, I found it difficult to see a way forward. My saving grace was that my book had been rejected nicely. ‘Cheer up’ my agent said. ‘Usually they don’t bother writing back when they don’t want to publish it’. They had all written and said encouraging things.

The days were dark but I had enough savings in the bank to take a few months off so I ditched the day job, got my head down and started a blog. Partly because I wanted to claim ownership over my idea, partly because I wanted to show publishers that my idea had legs but mostly because I realised that my life was weird. Who else goes around asking people to tell them about virginity loss? I wanted to share my odd adventures with the world at large.

Predictably, I was petrified when I began. I could barely press the ‘send’ button, so nervous was I about exposing myself but once again, it was one of the best things I could have done. I was lonely at home with my stack of rejection letters but those early months of blogging were a revelation to me. I was astonished at what a friendly place the blogosphere is. How people you have never met before are quite prepared to give you a digital ‘leg up’ over a metaphorical wall. Shel Israel writes a blog about social media and technology. He doesn’t know me from Adam but he liked my idea and he wrote about it. Bingo! Traffic came my way. I caught on quickly and I kept going, kept pressing the send button despite having limited confidence in my voice. Day by day, as winter turned to spring; people began to engage with the material, and, joy of joys; they began sending in their own stories. In April of that year, I scored a full page of editorial in the Sunday Times News Review. (Which I would link to if it weren’t for that PESKY pay wall).

Fast forward almost four winters and I found myself finally finishing that book. Icon Books had commissioned me…and they wanted the manuscript in 3 months’ time. Yikes. Time and again as I rose in the dark last winter, and it was a literal darkness this time, not metaphorical, I realised that coming to the page each day is an act of faith. You have no idea if something will come out. Deadlines don’t care whether or not you’re feeling inspired but the only way to find out is to try. Sometimes nothing happens. Sometimes it feels really uncomfortable but you have to keep going, however mind crushingly painful it may feel and eventually, something pops out. A spark of an idea comes. Pursue that spark, hunt it down, keep chasing that idea and watch it open like a flower.

The catch is that the human mind is forgetful so sometimes you have to go through this process every day. Sometimes it’s really boring. From time to time last winter I thought to myself, you know what? I really don’t feel like doing this today. Then came the awful realisation that if I didn’t do it, no one else would. It was my book, full of my ideas and if you don’t keep writing, there will be nothing to show for your endeavours. So man up, stick yourself in front of the keyboard and keep moving. Pursuing dreams, pursuing creativity, it’s all the same thing. The trick is that you cannot guarantee a return; you have to believe that you will get one. It’s only then, when you’re prepared to take a leap off a creative cliff and find out what’s on the other side that the exciting stuff begins to happen.

My book came out in May. New York, or more to the point, America, was the next step as far as I was concerned. That hasn’t happened (yet). But in June, I was approached by a theatre producer. ‘I’d like to make your book into a play’ he said. He was a Northerner (always a good sign) and he had some adventurous ideas.  Once again, I took a detour that I hadn’t intended to take and it turned out to be a wonderful thing.

My life is still weird. Last weekend, I found myself at Cheltenham Literary Festival. I had done an event there on Friday night and the entire Cheltenham experience was a joy from start to finish. I spent Saturday morning watching Arlene Phillips pirouette around the Writers Room and the afternoon chatting with the very affable Roger McGough. By Monday I was back behind my desk, starting a new PA contract. I barely know who I am anymore but I’m not complaining. The day job helps my writing life because I work for really clever, interesting people who inspire me to do better. I learn as much as I can from them whilst hopefully making their lives easier in return.

Where to next? I have no idea. I’ve learnt not to make predictions but I do know this: for every single thing that doesn’t happen, something will happen that you couldn’t have foreseen.  You couldn’t make it up. And you don’t have to because it’s going to happen anyway.

In the spirit of today’s post – and all the late bloomers of the world - here is a story that you couldn’t make up. It’s all true.

‘Hi Kate,

I am 30 years old and I lost my virginity last night.

I wanted to share my story as it seemed that as I went past the age of 25, I would never lose it. I was slightly obsessed and very ashamed of my virginity and made endless plans to lose it with an escort or a random one night stand. This never happened and would make me feel worse as I couldn't go through with any plans as they always seemed wrong.

I even consulted an intimacy clinic who agreed to carry out sex therapy with me using a surrogate...who was at least fifty years old. They couldn't understand why I was not keen to have sex with a man old enough to be my father and the whole experience made my self-esteem plummet. It seemed that even the 'experts' couldn't help. 

All the time I was dating. Meeting guys and then finding a flaw with them so I didn't have to get too close. Nobody was quite right for me and I honestly believed that only Mr Perfect would do. I was convinced everybody could tell I was a virgin and had to watch as my much younger sister got a serious boyfriend and moved in with him. I felt stuck. Not quite an adult, yet in some ways a woman old before my time - a Maiden Aunt.

I had gone to University at 21, as I had been a carer for my mother during part of my teen years, and when she later died I spent my early twenties grieving and trying to get my head around how different my life was to my peers. When I was still a virgin on the final day of University in 2005, I gave up all hope.

A couple of years ago I sought help one last time and went into therapy with a local psychotherapist. I went for eighteen months and the change in my life and mental processes was astonishing. She helped me to feel normal and to see that my family experiences had shaped my life so far and how I could remove this block. I started to meet more men who were attracted to me and I became more open to relationships.

Two months ago I met a guy who is the same age as me and although there were several times that I wanted to end things because of some 'flaw',  I recognised what I was doing and kept seeing him. He didn't pressure me and we gradually got closer.

Last night, aided by a couple of bottles of wine, I had sex for the first time. It was in parts awkward, painful, extremely pleasurable and a massive relief! He couldn't enter me all that successfully but said it was because he was nervous. Eventually he started to use his fingers and we got there. All I could think was ' Finally'! Today I have felt sore, I bled a little but thinking about the experience turns me on, rather than off. I can already see how pleasurable sex is going to be. My boyfriend has suggested that we go away for a couple of nights in a few weeks and I feel really close to him. Hopefully things will get better and better.

I regret not having sex sooner as I can see how much I have missed out on, but I realise that this was the right time for me.

I wanted to share my story to show that change is possible with the right help.’ 

Close encounters with Rob Lowe....

So I’m hanging out at the RGS last week for Rob Lowe’s ‘In Conversation’ event and I decide to mix things up by giving him a copy of my book at his book signing event afterwards. He takes this pretty well and even looks quite pleased to receive it. (I can’t deny it’s also lovely to meet Sam Seaborn in the flesh).

A couple of days later, I am wondering if he’s actually had a peep at it – or did he just give it away the moment I was out of sight? Next thing you know, I’m on the internet. Who knows, he might have got papped later that night going out for dinner. Sure enough, as I type in the words, ‘Rob Lowe’ + ‘May 25^th’, the pictures pop up: Rob Lowe, leaving The Ivy that very night. I flick through the shots and there it is. To the left of the frame, held in Rob Lowe’s assistant’s hand. My book.

It’s the little things in life…

I got an email from a female reader this week that really delighted me. She mailed to tell me that her husband had just said ‘I really love that virginity book. And my husband is not a man given to expressing his feelings’ she continued. I was amazed. I thought this was a women’s book. What moved him to say this I asked? ‘The stories aren’t just about virginity’, he replied, ‘they are an insight into people’s lives’.

Indeed they are. This isn’t just a book about our first sexual encounters; it is a book about the ways in which our lives have changed over the last 80 years. It is also a book about the way that we really feel about our intimate lives, no holds barred and no attempts to big ourselves up. Everyone in this book had a pseudonym so they could say exactly what they wanted. I was only ever interested in the truth.

In the meantime, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that men like it as I communicate with them on a daily basis via my blog and the fabulous stories that they tell. I went to lengths to ensure that the book cover wasn’t exclusively ‘female’ too. Ok, so it has flowers on it but the first version had a pink background which I felt was misleading. The inky blue that you see below projects mystery and intrigue…much like virginity loss as it happens.

 

 

One does turn into something of a nutter once one’s book comes out. I can’t deny that I harbour thoughts of re-arranging the shelves of my local Waterstones and WH Smiths so that my book is always at the front of the selection. But I haven’t done it…yet. In other news, my book and me will be doing our first ever television appearance tomorrow on The Vanessa Show on Channel 5, which I am molto excited about. Not least because it also features the legendary Arlene Phillips…..I might just bust some moves whilst I am there.

What is it with the twists and the turns in the tales this week? After last week’s page turner, here’s another. I’ll try not to ruin the ending by telling you it before you’ve begun this time.

I read this story whilst en route to Chris Morgan Jones’s book launch in London’s Diagon Alley-esque Cecil Court. Very early on in my book publishing adventures, Chris’s lovely wife got me a meeting with the legendary Lennie Goodings of Virago Press. I had very little concept at the time of just how important this meeting was – or how important Lennie was in the world of British book publishing. Had I known, I probably would have been a nervous wreck. As somebody memorably said to me afterwards, 'most writers would crawl over broken glass to get a meeting with Lennie Goodings'....

As it happens, I never did quite ‘seal the deal’ with Lennie but the fact that she was prepared to sit and entertain me and my book idea for a good 45 minutes one winter’s afternoon in the offices of Virago Press meant the world to me. It gave my idea gravitas and more importantly, it gave me bags of confidence. Fast forward 5 years, 2 agents and all sorts of twists and turns in the world of publishing and Icon Books have published my book ‘The First Time: True Tales of Virginity Lost & Found (Including My Own). And I finally got to have my own book launch at Lutyens & Rubinstein Book Shop in Notting Hill:

Which was all a long way of telling you that my blackberry only allowed me to read half the story below before it truncated the message and I had to wait until the next day to find out the ending. Once again, still trying not to give it away….so here it is.

'I had been with Jonny 4 months, I was 18 and had waited to have sex as I truly wanted the experience to be special and with someone I loved. 

I had met Jonny a year before and at first did not take to him. It had been a night full of drinks and at the end of it; I had been talking to a friend, telling them my woes of the current man who was taking up the space within my head.  Jonny walked past us, turned, looked at me and said 'get over it, he obviously isn’t into you'. Of course my reaction was to wonder who was the arrogant conceited man who had just walked past and stuck his nose in for no reason other then to be spiteful.

A little time passed and I was working part time selling magazines door to door, the advantage being that I got a team of friends who would walk the streets together after Sixth Form College and try and sell these charity magazines.  One day Jonny turned up. I turned to my friend and said 'he's horrible, I don’t like him' to which my friend replied 'Ha I know him, actually he's a really good guy'.  That evening, once again, I was selling the magazines door to door and Jonny was placed on my team. There is little to say other than, I have not laughed like that in years, we immediately hit it off. Long story short, it took a year to become Jonny’s girlfriend as I was still holding out for the guy who I should 'get over'.

One day like a thunderbolt it hit me. Who made me laugh? Who did I fancy? Who was a friend? Who acted like they would treat me like a princess? The answer, Jonny.  So I became his girlfriend, four lovely months later and we were out on our usual Thursday night rock night at the local pub. I had by this point stressed to Jonny the importance of my virginity to me, I had stated that it need not be lost in a fairy tale romance but it should be lost in a sensitive and caring environment where I felt safe and loved.

I felt ready at four months but I was holding out for Jonny to do something special, candles maybe, music.  Just something to show he cared.  So back to the night out, I had drunk so much that I could hardly walk, Jonny was due to meet his friends at a club but I had to return home.  Jonny agreed to walk me home. The entire way I begged him not to leave to stay and be with me, but he wanted to go, there was no persuading him.  So eventually I turned and said 'if you stay I'll have sex with you'. He agreed and we returned to my home and with my mother upstairs we lay down on the living room floor and had short, painful sex.  It did not last long and my head was spinning, after an awkward ten minutes, Jonny withdrew and stood up, put his pants on and sat on the couch and fell asleep, I sat there naked wondering why I had just used my virginity as a bargaining tool and did I regret not holding out.  I was hurt by the lack of comfort, but in a way relieved that finally it had happened. 

Do I regret it, hmmm…No I don’t think I do, as it taught me a cold hard truth, sometimes things just don’t turn out the way you planned.  Me and Jonny split after 2 and half years, we remain in contact but loosely...'

Thursday is the best day of the week...

Today is an auspicious day. It is the day that my book is officially published and I am off the scale excited. I haven’t quite worked out what the form is yet. Does one rush into one’s local book store, pick up a copy of one’s ‘baby’ and scream at the top of your lungs ‘I WROTE THIS!! To anyone who will listen? I feel inclined to do so but being British and all, I’ll try to hold myself back.

In the meantime, I would like to say a huge thank you to all the people who continue to write and tell me the most brilliant stories. You’re the best. Today’s story teller is no exception.

Born 1991, lost virginity aged 19

'There are two words that immediately come to mind when I think about my experience of losing my virginity. One is ‘awkward’ and the other is ‘perfect’.

My religious tradition definitely had an effect on my opinions, but not, most likely, in the way that would be expected. I grew up in the Unitarian Universalist church, which didn’t give any kind of moral position on the issue, but emphasized a personal search for the truths that resonate most with you in all areas of life.

So sometime around age fourteen, I sat down and thought about what virginity meant to me, and I came up with a few conclusions and rules for myself. Waiting until marriage didn’t hold any importance to me; I guess I’ve never been romantic about marriage, viewing it as a celebration and formalization of an existing commitment rather than something that should particularly change the nature of a relationship. What was important to me was not rushing into something I would regret later and making sure the time was right. I swore to myself that I would feel ready on my own and I would be in love before I would even think about having sex. I took one of the virginity pledge cards in the they handed out in sex ed my Freshman year of high school - not because I bought into the ideology behind them but as a personal reminder of my promise to myself not to rush into something before I was ready.

In retrospect, I think it may have been a bit naïve to bank on concepts as subjective as being ‘ready’ and ‘in love’, just assuming I would recognize them when I experienced them. At the time, I just knew I definitely didn’t meet either condition yet. And I continued to go on as such for quite some time. I had my first relationship at sixteen, which took several months to get to kissing and never progressed much further. I was intensely ‘in like’ and loved him as friend, but it took eight months before I ever thought of myself as being in love with him. Around eight months I also started thinking I could see the possibility of having sex with him at some point, but not anytime soon. A month later, we broke up.

My next relationship didn’t go nearly that far, as it died almost as soon as it began due to my not really being over the previous one. I knew plenty of people my age who were getting it on, but the majority of my close friends were also virgins, and quite proud of it between ourselves.

In the meantime, I maintained my resolve with a lot of masturbation and becoming intimately acquainted with fantasy. I delved into the internet’s supply of erotic fiction, and started writing my own. I found out what turned me on and what didn’t, and had the time to get comfortable with things that initially seemed a little too much (the concept of giving blowjobs, for instance: intimidating as hell at sixteen or seventeen; hot as hell a few years later). I was excited about the prospect of having sex someday, but I knew I wasn’t nearly ready yet for that day to come.

And then about halfway through my Freshman year of college, I pretty much woke up one day from a really hot dream and realized I was ready. My previous methods of staving off frustration were no longer sufficient, and I was a little bit scared by the strength of my libido. I pretty much expected I would have sex in my next relationship, and I reasoned that it was okay if I wasn’t actually in love as long as I was in a reasonably committed relationship, but at the same time I was a little disturbed at the weakening of that condition. The thing was, at that point I’d been single for nearly two years, and I didn’t see any prospect of a relationship happening any time soon.

Until, that Spring, I fell hard for one of my best friends. And, although I’m still at a loss as to why, the feelings were mutual. Quite apart from my general horniness and the circumstances seeming right, right from the start it became clearer and clearer to me that this was the boy I wanted to be my first. He was sweet, and caring, and had a good sense of humour – which in some ways I found one of the most important traits; a laughing, ‘Biology is awkward,’ became somewhat of a catchphrase between us during our early explorations of each others’ bodies – and I felt comfortable talking about absolutely anything with him. He was also a fellow virgin, which was a bit of a surprise considering he was a year older than me and had a considerably longer dating history, and somewhat of a disappointment to me, as I’d always kind of hoped to have someone more experienced to guide me, but I dismissed that as an insignificant detail.

We progressed to increasingly heavier petting fairly rapidly, and as the first full month of our relationship and my nineteenth birthday approached, I shyly brought up that I would be interested in having sex with him at some indistinct time in the relatively near future.

He said he wasn’t ready. I said okay and didn’t bring it up again. We continued at about the same intensity of fooling around as we had been, ramping up maybe a little bit slower than before. Two months passed, and summer break began, turning our relationship long-distance (and I’m talking 4000 miles apart long-distance).

And about two weeks into the three month break, during one of our daily long phone calls, he told me he loved me for the first time and that he’d changed his mind and wanted to have sex with me when we got to see each other again. Anticipation made it an extremely long summer.

I got on birth control pills as soon as I got back on campus and impatiently waited the two weeks for the protection to be active while we wrestled with the logistics of a living situation that made it much harder to find privacy than it had been the previous year until my roommate took pity on me and arranged to be elsewhere for a night.

I had no illusions about expecting fireworks or anything from the first time; I was expecting a good experience. And I pretty much got what I expected. There was some pain at first, but it wasn’t a lot and it faded quickly, and I bled just a little bit. There were a whole lot of awkward little mishaps, from struggling to get the condom on to him banging his head on the upper bunk while getting in bed and me accidentally putting my panties on inside out afterwards, but there was also a whole lot of laughter. I admit to feeling a bit, ‘That was it? That’s what all the fuss is about?’ In the immediate aftermath, but I ended up somehow feeling closer to him all the same. We made another go of it later that night and got things going a lot more smoothly, and since then it’s only gotten better.'

 

You're the one that I want....

I can’t deny that I did think about jumping on the royal bandwagon and writing a wedding themed post and then I changed my mind. Kind of.

This week I have traveled to Manchester with the very fabulous Suzi Godson to do next Monday’s edition of Woman’s Hour. Together we met the legendary Jenni Murray and did our best not to swear by mistake on the show. I have also been into several bookshops to innocently enquire after a tome called ‘The First Time: True Tales of Virginity Lost & Found (Including My Own). I usually crack when they ask if it’s by Kate Monro and admit that I am she. I wonder at what point I will get bored of this game.

On a more serious note, I have fielded questions about the impending release of said book from my 13 year old nephew. I feel slightly guilty about the fact that I have written one of those books that I had to climb the bookcase to retrieve at great personal risk when I was his age. Naturally I chickened out and sent him in the direction of his mother.

More to the point, how am I going to stop my stepfather from reading the first story in the men’s chapter?? I think I am going to have to find a way of temporarily blindfolding him because when push comes to shove, I am far more worried about corrupting his relatively innocent mind than my 13 year old nephew’s!

But all in all, generally speaking, I can say that publishing my first book has far surpassed my expectations and it hasn’t even come out yet.

Until it does, here is today’s story. Hailing from the States, ladies and gentleman, I give you the modern day Danny and Sandy….

‘My name is Tegan. I’m now 17 years old and live in the US. But before I tell you my story, I think you should know a little bit about me. I’ve always been the straight A student, the very religious girl, you get the picture. But then I started dating Mark. We met at school freshman year; we started dating a month later. Mark was what most people would refer to as the ‘popular’ guy in school. He was known for being the star athlete…you know the type. He had an i-don’t-care attitude that attracted me to him, which was odd considering I had only dated the quiet, shy guys.

I honestly couldn’t tell you why I started dating him because I don’t even know myself. I never pictured myself with anyone other than your typical nerd. He just wasn’t my type; I definitely wasn’t his either. But it felt like with him…I had to make an exception. It was like we balanced each other out. I was quiet, he was outgoing. After a few months of dating we became best friends. I guess you could say we were pretty much inseparable. Six months into our relationship we began doing things I never planned on until after I was married...oral sex. After a few months of that, we wanted more. Not exactly sex itself, but the closeness that came with it.

I was fifteen when I lost my virginity to Mark. His family was out of town for his sister’s volleyball tournament, and he told his parents he was coming to my house that Saturday. I told my parents I was going to his, for they didn’t know his family was gone. It took a lot of planning, but it worked. We hadn’t exactly talked about having sex that day, though we had talked about having sex before.

The minute we stepped in his house we quickly went up to his room. We kissed and before I knew it our clothes we in the floor. We spent quite a long time ‘warming up’ if you get what I’m saying. I was more scared than nervous when we finally did it. It wasn’t like you read about in books or watch in movies at all. It took a while before he could get it in. And when he finally did, it hurt. It hurt bad. But not in a bad way. He didn’t last long, but that was okay; I’d come closer to him than I had been with anyone in my whole life, and that’s all we had wanted. I had his virginity, and he had mine.       

I’m seventeen now, and I don’t regret anything that’s happened between Mark and I. We aren’t like the crazy sex-obsessed teens today. We have sex to feel closer to one another. Not just to have sex. Although I’m still a Christian, I’ve come to believe that sex is okay as long as it’s for the right reasons. Maybe Mark and I will end up together, maybe not. But I know for a fact I couldn’t have asked for a better guy to experience this with. No, our story wasn’t the make-believe story everyone talks about…but it was our own story.’

There's a first time for everything...including publishing books..

And whilst we’re on the subject of my book, which we weren’t but we are now. It’s been a while since I sat down and wrote a post that didn’t have a story in it but which simply discussed what might be going on in my head. So I thought I’d take this opportunity to tell you how life is now that I have finished writing my book and more critically, found a publisher to publish it.

Lets go back for a moment. I began this project on a whim. I was looking for something to do with my life and when I had the idea, I felt right inside of me that I had found a concept with resonance. Quite apart from anything else, I figured that I would never be short of material because pretty much every human being has got something to say about virginity loss. Starting this blog only opened the field wider and connected me to a whole bunch of people whom I might not have encountered in everyday life. To this day I love gathering and hearing these stories.

It might sound strange to say it but for me, this project was never about virginity loss per se. It was more that I wanted to get people to tell stories about their lives, to talk about what’s under the surface, to talk about the things that we don’t talk about. I wanted to know what people really thought about the intimate experiences in their lives, and not what they thought they should think. Asking people to talk about such a singular moment turned out to be the key to the door.

Along the way, my own life has changed. All those mornings spent reading for research - history books, medical books and sociology books on the London Underground have filled in some serious gaps in my education. I also found a tenacity that I didn’t know I had. Five years is a long time to hold on for a publishing deal…

In preparation for the release of my ‘first born’, I now lead a bizarre double life. Working as a freelance PA, my days are spent organizing other people’s diaries whilst attempting to wrestle control over my own. I did a radio interview from a cupboard in the office yesterday – for real. I organize my bosses travel arrangements whilst booking my own photo sessions and prepping for interviews with journalists. The assistant needs an assistant….needless to say, I am loving every minute of this mayhem as I prepare to release my little protege into the world.

Where am I going with this? I don’t know really, except to say that it is a lovely feeling to see the hours spent interviewing, transcribing, editing and writing turn into something quite tangible and real. I held a copy in my own hands when it came back fresh from the printers last week and I felt as proud as any new mother. I imagine most first time authors would describe it thus. But of course it wouldn’t be possible to experience such a feeling unless so many of you had taken the time, the effort and the leap of faith that it requires to recount such an intimate tale to another human being. So please take this as a thank you, all you wonderful, helpful, maverick people who have been prepared to take a chance and trust me with your first time stories. Quite apart from anything else, you helped turn my little dream into a big reality and for that I am eternally grateful! But along the way, I hope that your stories will have an effect on other people’s lives too because no matter what we become, this experience remains shrouded in secrecy. People will always wonder if what they had was normal, right, wrong, the best, the worst - however you want to think about it - these questions will always get asked and now perhaps, we have provided some answers together.