The Virginity Project

Baby you can (try to) drive my car..

Life is made up of all sorts of journeys: the journey from child to adult hood, the journey from single life to marriage and of course, the all important journey to work. From time to time, one puts pen to paper and thinks, I can’t really be bothered to write about virginity loss today. Today I would like to write about the action packed adventure I had between the hours of 9 and 11am this morning. So that’s what I’m going to do.

It all started with a 9am trip to the vet. I didn’t actually have to take the pet in question with me as I was only going to get test results so the drama factor was reduced by 75% before I’d even stepped out of the door. It turns out the little darling probably does need an operation which isn’t the best news but neither is it the worst. Suck it up, I thought to myself as I stepped out of the vets surgery 40 minutes later.  

In the meantime, the world had changed. What started out as a reasonably – and I use that word lightly. I do hate the typically British habit of moaning about the weather but really, even I have been tested to the limit this summer – nice day, had now turned into weather Armageddon. Dogs and Cats seems the most appropriate phrase. It was pouring and I was glad I had bought the motor instead of my bike. I legged it across the road to my trusty Renault 5. As I pulled out of the car park, my right hand windscreen wiper spazzed out. When I say spazzed out, I mean to say that it ceased to function. Hmm, that’s handy when it’s raining. Not. It’ll be fine I thought to myself as I pulled out into the main road. It really won’t I thought 3 seconds later. It was like trying to drive with Vaseline smeared across your eyeballs. Quite apart from the imminent danger posed to every other road user in the vicinity.

Have you ever tried to drive your car in a straight line whilst leaning across the passenger seat to see out of your one functioning window? I don’t recommend it. I realised that I was going to have to ditch the car and take the bus to work. The deluge continued as I narrowly averted death for the 3 minutes it took to ‘drive’ home. I parked up, grabbed an umbrella and waded to the bus stop. By this point, it was hard to believe that it was actually August as the sky grew darker and the rain turned from the cat and dog variety to horse and donkey sized raindrops. The bus came mercifully quickly.

We got as far as St John’s Wood before part two of my interesting morning began. You know what it’s like. You’re sitting staring out of the window for some time before you realise that the bus hasn’t actually moved for several minutes. Eventually I became aware of a repetitive voice downstairs, whining the same words over and over again….how am supposed to get my bags off this bus when she’s just sitting there and it’s raining this much..etc etc etc and accompanied by much tutting from the passengers and silence from the driver…..

At this point, I must time travel back to Tuesday night and take you with me. On Tuesday night I was in Chalk Farm Road waiting for a bus. The last light of the day was fading as me and my fellow wait-ees watched a statuesque lady stride down the main road carrying so many tightly packed bits of luggage on her shoulders, arms and wrists that it looked as if lots of little air bags had burst out of her body. Not only that but she was holding up an entire line of traffic as she strode. She either didn’t notice or didn’t care. She took her own sweet time before changing tack, releasing the traffic and crossing over to our bus stop. She looked entirely unmoved by the whole episode and boarded my bus as if she walked down main roads holding up traffic every day.

Fast forward to Thursday morning and she was back on my bus again, but this time, I was the one being held up. The rain continued to pour and eventually the driver snapped the engine off to the collective cries of my fellow travellers. I walked downstairs and there she was, remonstrating with the driver. ‘How am I supposed to get off the bus with all these bags, in all this rain with ‘her’ standing in my way’….which was curious as there wasn’t anyone in standing in the way at all, just a lone woman having a seemingly quite complicated conversation with a very cheesed off bus driver in the pouring rain…..but now her dilemma had become ours as we all got off the bus and stepped into the wall of water coming out of the sky.

I’m a lucky person though because there was another 31 bus right behind it. I arrived in Camden 50 minutes behind schedule. I squelched the final 5 minutes in shoes that were now falling off my feet due to the onslaught, bought a coffee at Pret and witnessed a man walking past Mornington Crescent tube wearing nothing but a pair of shorts and a Peruvian woolly hat tied tightly under his chin. As you do.

Naturally, it is now sunny blue skies outside, almost as if the entire episode never happened.

I’m glad I’ve got that off my chest. Now, would you like to vote for me to win the Cosmopolitan Blog Award in the ‘Sex & Relationships’ category? I would be absolutely over the moon, hands down the happiest I’ve ever been if I thought I had even an outside chance of winning. If so, follow the link, fill in the spaces – you might have to tell them why you like my blog. One friend said it was because he thought I had nice hair – and press send. THANK YOU!

 

From France with love..

From time to time, the Virginity Project likes to disappear off into the ether. There’s nothing quite like getting on a train at Kings Cross St Pancreas on a Saturday morning and knowing that when you get off, you will be somewhere quite different. This is exactly what I did the weekend before last. Eight hours of flashing windows and increasingly beautiful countryside later, I arrived in Toulouse. Another 60 minutes in a car and I was secreted deep into the countryside. Far away from cities, mobile phone signals and, in fact, anything that resembles my normal life. Trees, cows, grass and mountains.  That’s it.

 

I was born in the countryside but you’d never believe it. The first time I stayed in this region twenty years ago, I didn’t sleep a wink for the first week because of the silence. I was so used to the early morning chorus of articulated trucks making their way past my bedroom window that their absence made me twitchy. Even with my boyfriend sleeping at my side, the silence meant only one thing to me. If there were any nutters in the region, and in my imagination there almost certainly were, they would be making their way round to our house and slipping in through our open window to murder ME in the middle of the night.

Clearly they didn’t get around to it on that time. These days I’m still slightly agitated after the first 48 hours in the countryside. It’s not just the silence. It’s that I do actually like being around people. I find them intriguing and inspiring and I want to sit and cafes and stations just looking at what the populace of other countries do. I can’t understand a word they are saying but it doesn’t matter. It’s different from my everyday life and it’s like having a drink of fresh water.  I’m not generally in the business of travel journalism but if you do ever happen to be in the Ariege, you have to go to Mirepoix market on a Monday morning. It’s stuffed to the brim with outstanding (and overpriced) cheese, honey, cured meats and bread but it’s also like stepping onto a film set. It’s a beautiful medieval market place replete with herbalists, singers, knife sharpeners and animals. You never know what you might find. ‘I once saw a camel in Mirepoix market’ I said to my mother as we wondered around.  ' That’s nothing’ she replied, ‘I saw a bear here once’. (Both true!)

 
 

But in the end, the silence got to me in a good way. I started waking early and wondering into the meadows. The weight and the glossiness of the morning dew was really something. I spent ages trying to take pictures of it. And then one day I flung the camera aside and dropped my face down into the grass to feel it. (Now I can say I’ve drunk real Mountain Dew).

 

But mostly I just sat on the grassy hillside with a cup of tea, unused notebook at my side just letting time pass by. It’s such a cliché but there are so few moments like that in life these days. I adore modern technology but it was so nice to get away from it. ‘Am officially in the Middle of Nowhere’, I tweeted one day. ‘I have to hang off the edge of a hill to send this tweet. But not entirely disliking that.’ My brother in law had mentioned how thrilled he was to hear the sound of a nightingale singing when he went walking one day. I didn’t really get that at first. And then I did. The morning chorus was something to behold. As was the most bizarre collection of insects I’ve ever plucked from a swimming pool in my life. Don’t sweat the small stuff they say. But it’s damn nice to sit and stare at it sometimes.

 
 

FYI if you are planning any trips of your own – and possess a kindle - there is a special offer on the downloadable version of my book ‘The First Time: True Tales of Virginity Lost & Found (Including my own) on Amazon right now. Enjoy & happy journeys!

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.

Happy Friday....

If you notice any strange activity on The Virginity Project today, that's because we are having a facelift - about time! See you shortly on the other side.....

My, what pointy boots you are wearing....

 There are various reasons as to why I have a day job. Mainly they involve money as I do find the stuff comes in handy but there is more to it than that. The biggest draw is that one really does enjoy working in a creative environment and right now, this piece of creative is doing it for me big time. It’s not just that its smart, funny and beautifully executed, no, peep a little closer and breathe in what this image is really saying to you.

 
Personally speaking, I was going to write a whole piece about why this picture encapsulates everything that has changed since my grandmother’s day. We all know the tale of Little Red Riding Hood. In my grandmother’s era, and even in my own story telling days, Little Red Riding Hood tiptoed timidly through the forest, making sure she didn't get in anybodies way until of course she encountered the big bad wolf……apropos of nothing, we used to play a game in my grandparents garden when I was a child called ‘What’s the time Mr Wolf’. In it, Mr Wolf, a role performed mostly by my older, bigger cousins, would stand at the end of the garden with his back to us littler ones. ‘What’s the time Mr Wolf?’ we would whisper breathlessly as we stole up the lawn behind my cousins back knowing, that if he turned around and saw any of us moving, we would be sent back to the bottom of the garden to begin all over again.

The hi-light, the crux, the part of this game that made us almost choke with anticipation was when we asked the question once too often and the answer came booming back down the garden, ‘ITS DINNER TIME!!’ as ran screaming down the garden as fast as our tiny legs would carry us, the unfortunate recipient of my cousin's snapping ‘teeth’ being consigned to play the part of the wolf the next time around. Happy days… and very little to do with virginity or Little Red Riding Hood, although if you read this wikipedia entry, it does suggest that the story of Little Red Riding Hood may be a parable about sexual maturity. In it, the wolf represents a man who intends to relieve Little Red Riding Hood of something that was worth far more to a woman of my grandmother’s generation than it is to most women in the western world today.

But I changed my mind because, lest we forget, in pretty much most versions of this story, Little Red Riding Hood does actually manage to outwit the so-called cunning wolf – but perhaps not in the grand style that she does it above….power boots, the unlucky wolf’s tale dangling elegantly over the edge of her basket and the bloodied axe still clutched firmly in ‘Little’ Red Riding Hood’s hand. Love it.

Winter ain't so bad after all..

The Virginity Project has mostly been hanging out in the mountains. It snowed a lot and on the last day, just as I turned and started up the hill to send some postcards...

...past the back of the house I was staying in....

...and up towards the cutest little alpine village that you can possibly imagine, the sun cracked through the clouds and it looked a little bit like this….

Those summer nights...

 

I cannot think of a better way to spend ten minutes than to read these four fabulous stories, all inspired by the theme of ‘summer encounters’. Funny, touching, perfect. Enjoy...

The Virginity Project has been larging it on a beach in Greece for the last few weeks and it’s been brilliant. I spent much of my teenage years visiting a Greek island called Anti-Paros when unbeknownst to me, paradise was right next door!

Sifnos - yes, it does sound like a sexually transmitted disease but I can assure you that its not - is a sensational island. Of course I would have been bored out of my mind if I’d come here in my twenties, ‘paradise’ being such a subjective concept. But right now, at this stage of the game, it’s pretty much like crash landing in heaven.

I’ve finally got what Otis Reading was talking about when he wrote ‘Sitting in the dock of the bay’. Is there anything more pleasant to do than watch large ships pull into a tiny harbour, unload some people, cars and chaos as an overexcited port policeman motors around trying to direct them all into their correct position and then collapse back into the sand once its all over, grateful that all I have to do is watch and eat an ice cream? I don’t think so.

Actually I did do some sensible reading whilst I was away. I’ve read it before but every morning before it got too hot, I went and re-read a chapter of Anka Bernau’s brilliant ‘Virgins – A Cultural History’ on the steps of the Greek orthodox church. There was no particular point to the location, just that it was shady with a nice view. Some mornings there were ladies in the church jabbering away in a language that I obviously don’t understand and I had the vaguest sense that they might be talking about me.  Like why does that woman come and read a book about virginity loss on the steps of this church every morning?

On the days when I didn’t get up early enough and the sun had already moved around past the church, because let me tell you, on some mornings it was 32 degrees by 9.30am. Yes, 32 degrees…I moved up to the Old Captain’s Bar, a shady spot on the beach run by a charismatic man called Theo. Here I sat and read my book with a cup of tea and some assistance from Theo’s rather camp cat, Zaza...

Other highlights of the trip included eating cream pie and this is not a euphemism for anything except eating cake. Cream pie, or Bougatza as it is known, asides from civilization, is clearly one of the best Greek inventions ever. I have no idea what they put in it but it smells like sugar and cinnamon and vanilla and when you sink your teeth into the crispy layers of filo pastry and reach the smooth custardy but not too sweet centre and finally round yourself off with the white dusty icing sugar on the outside….you may just as well utter a round of cliché ridden expletives about dying and going to heaven, discovering things that are better than sex etc etc etc blah blah blah….funnily enough, the only vaguely attractive man in the entire town also worked behind the counter of the pie shop.

On the days when we weren’t reading, eating sweets or watching boats, we amused ourselves with the following conversation. Bear in mind that it was usually 38 degrees by this point.

Stacey: ‘I’m feeling a bit nippy, how about you?

Me: Freezing. You can borrow one of my jumpers if you like?

 S: Could I? Can I take some of those woolly socks and scarves as well?

Me: Sure thing. How about we light a fire, pop some extra layers on and I’ll send Celia down to the taverna for some hot soup?

S: Lovely. Then once we’ve layered ourselves up with scarves, gloves and thermal gear, how about we climb thse 330 steps up that dry, arid slope to the church over there, say, at around 1pm?’

Oh how we laughed. You had to be there. It was scorching.

When nighttime came, some of this was involved too: 

But nothing like the old days. Partly because Europe is so expensive right now and paying 10 euro's for cocktail doesn’t feel like a paticularly healthy pastime but mainly because early morning in Greece is so beautiful that I didn’t want to miss a single moment of it...

 

Sunshine on a rainy day...

If you’re sitting at work staring into space and thinking to yourself that sun really should be enjoyed whilst actually sitting in it…as opposed to observing it through a pane of glass, here is a Grade A, top quality virginity related distraction. This will keep you quiet for a good ten minutes. It has all the charm, pathos and shock value of the mighty Post Secret but without the visuals.

And you can probably tell that I wrote that a couple of days ago when I was a. at work and b. The sun was actually shining. As opposed to today when I am contemplating a trip to a field in Somerset and the celebration of a friends birthday in a large tent alongside the promise of rain. What it is to be British. Virtually a moment goes by when we feel we can’t possibly continue unless we mention the weather.

No matter. I am off to Greece on Monday for my holidays but before I go, here is an interesting little story that I found when I was searching on ‘gay virginity loss’. I was actually looking for a rock solid definition of virginity loss and whilst this story doesn’t supply that, it is still a beautifully crafted little tale with some vivid imagery.

Definitions have been on my mind lately as I work on the chapter of my book that seeks to define virginity loss. If anyone has anything to say on the matter, email me, I would love to hear what you think.

Is virginity loss a physical process? Or is it more of a spiritual or emotional matter? And how much does our definition of it change over the years? i.e. would you say the same now about virginity loss that you might have said twenty years ago….or do we refine our  definition of that ‘loss’ as we grow and change and become more reflective about the past?

Your contribution could be vital – please email me on [email protected]

Happy Holidays!