3B
Wednesday, December 6, 2017 // The Statement 

Soundtracking: Sex

I 

know what you’re thinking. What does 
a column-writing, grandma-sweater-
wearing kid who looks like the offspring 

of Woody Allen in “Annie Hall” and a cold bowl 
of clam chowder know about sex?

Long answer: Not very much, but I have drive 

and charisma and maybe an OK personality so 
that should make up for something.

Short answer: jack shit.
But what I do know is the road to sexual 

discovery (as if I’ve reached it yet) is paved 
with the most awkward experiences known 
to humankind. If I had to guess, I’d say the 
neanderthals would have appreciated the 
condom-on-the-banana lesson as much as I did 
if it was offered to them.

Very few big-budget blockbusters paint sex as 

I experienced it the first go-arounds. In movies, 
sex is passionate. It’s intense. It’s got “Take my 
Breath Away” by Berlin in the background like 
in “Top Gun.” Sex never includes your inner 
monologue of “Should this be doing that? 
Why am I hungry all of a sudden? Did I leave 
the kitchen sink running after washing dishes 
today?” in movies.

But we’re here to explore that side of the 

beautiful and painstaking experience that is 
learning about and living through losing your 
virginity. If I have to recount every moment 
leading up to that climax (or lack thereof), so be 
it. That is a sacrifice I am willing to make. I did 
this for you. Please don’t make me regret this.

“Let’s Talk About Sex” — Salt-N-Pepa
Just to be clear, I am not recommending you 

get down and dirty to the early-’90s drum beats 
of Salt-N-Pepa (unless that’s your thing — don’t 
knock it till you’ve tried it, I guess).

Where to start? In the very poignant and 

calculated words of Julie Andrews in “The 
Sound of Music,” “Let’s start at the very 
beginning, a very good place to start.”

The year is 2010. I’m in seventh grade and 

I think I know more about thermonuclear 
dynamics than I do about sex. I had just started 
dating my middle school girlfriend, whom I had 
asked out by sending her a green carnation for 
St. Patrick’s Day through a school fundraiser. 
On the note attached to the carnation written in 
my second-grader-esque handwriting: “I’d be 
so LUCKY if you went out with me.”

Yeah, I was a hopeless romantic. How the 

hell did I not know what sex was? I should 
have been the Wilt Chamberlain of my school 
district.

Well, in the classiest fashion, I took my 

new girlfriend to a middle school dance called 
Teen Night. It was held the first Friday of 
every month in the auditorium of the local 
community education center. There was a DJ, 
disco balls and pizza. Our parents dropped 
us off separately and we met at the door. We 
walked into the dance floor and I heard a song. 
To this day, I still believe it is the most beautiful 
song I have ever heard. A ballad of passion and 
romance with the lyrics rivaling the greatest 
works of Walt Whitman and Shakespeare.

“BedRock” — Young Money
“My room is the G-spot, call me Mr. 

Flintstone, I can make your bed rock.”

But what does it mean? I get the Flintstone 

thing. I watched a lot of Boomerang as a kid. 
But what in the wide, wide world of sports is a 
G-spot and why is his bed rocking? Is he having 
a nightmare or something? Sorry you aren’t 
sleeping well!

That was my thought process.
Flash forward to junior year of high school. 

My previous seventh grade flame and I had 
since broken up. The end of an era, honestly. A 
power couple that rivals rivaled Kimye’s star 
status.

By junior year, I had stopped wearing two 

different plaid patterns at once, but I wasn’t 
(and still am not) a stunner by any means. You 
could tell by the way I walked that I hadn’t had 
sex yet. In high school, sex is like a participation 
trophy. No one ever says the title means 
anything or if you actually did anything well. 
We just assume it was amazing because you got 
a trophy. As messed up as it sounds, high school 
is full of the worst gremlins you can imagine.

“You haven’t had sex yet? You’ll get there 

someday.”

I looked and felt like a dweebier Ken doll. 

Nothing below the belt.

“Like a Virgin” — Madonna
It was time to pull myself up by my 

bootstraps. I’ve always been an OK student. 
Whatever I need to learn, I study and study 
until my confidence rockets through the roof. 
Eventually, I come back down to reality once 
I realize how screwed I am when the exam 
comes but the confidence keeps me going. The 
same goes for learning about sex. Movies were 
no help. I only had one hope.

I’ll just say it.
There’s a Google search saved somewhere 

from my first time searching “porn” on my 
computer.

“Wet Dreamz” — J. Cole

Porn was my Mr. Miyagi. Whacks on, whacks 

off. (No more, I swear.)

I’ll spare you the long and arduous details 

but after emerging from my studies, I was ready 
to take on the world. I knew everything. The 
secrets of the world were open to me. I looked 
like Rocky entering the ring, overconfident and 
jumping around like an idiot.

A few months later, I was driving around in 

my 2004 Chevy Malibu with a girl I had been 
talking to. She goes to a different school, you 
wouldn’t know her. I knew she didn’t want to 
date but she was still talking to me which was 
definitely new so I thought something might 
happen. We didn’t have a destination. I didn’t 

know what she wanted and wasn’t about to 
try and guess. I’d rather drive to Ohio and back 
than make a wrong move.

My hands were starting to get clammy. 

My foot was tapping incessantly. My months 
of training didn’t leave me with a very good 
amount of control over my hormones and I was 
wearing skinny jeans so I basically wanted to 
end my life at that exact moment.

“Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?” — The 

Beatles

I wasted about three-quarters of a tank of gas 

driving around until I worked up the nerves to 
find some abandoned parking lot to stop in. My 
phone was at 6 percent from shuffling through 
every playlist I had ever created. I turned down 
the music a little bit and looked over to her. 
Then she leaped forward, grabbed my face 
and kissed me.

My entire face turned red. What is going 

on? This is new. This isn’t like my first kiss 
at the roller rink with that aforementioned 
seventh-grade girlfriend. I was incredibly 
sweaty.

Not just because I had been waiting for 

this since I started my training regiment, but 
because the air conditioning in my car was 
busted and we turned the engine off so no one 
knew we were here. It was basically a sauna.

“Hot in Herre” — Nelly
In movies, when characters are having 

sex in a steamy place like a car or shower or 
anything of that sorts and one character puts 
their hand against the glass, leaving a lustful 
handprint, you always assume it’s because 
the sex is so amazing, you need to hold on 
to something. You never assume it’s because 
it’s 120 DEGREES IN THIS HELLHOLE 
AND YOU’RE LIKE A DOG TRYING TO 
BREAK OUT OF THE BACKSEAT ON A 
SCORCHING SUMMER DAY.

I basically looked like I just got out of 

the pool in the least sexy way possible. But 
nonetheless, I was in no way complaining. 
She was leading every step of the way, which 
was kind of a dent to the large amounts of 
confidence I had built up over the course of 
my sexual awakening, but it would do.

I knew exactly what to do and how to sound 

and what noises to make from my dialogue 
studies. I had all the moves memorized. 
Nothing could go wrong.

“You Can Be as Loud as the Hell You Want 

(When You’re Makin’ Love)” — Avenue Q Cast

Except everything. Everything can go 

wrong.

Avenue Q lied to me. When you’re 

almost touching your toes, cramped and 
uncomfortable in the backseat of a 2004 
Chevy Malibu, you can most definitely cannot 
be as loud as the hell you want.

At the same time, nothing felt like I 

assumed it would from the hours (yeah 
I’m man enough to say hours) of porn I had 
watched in preparation. I kept thinking it 
should be different and eventually, my mind 
started to wander. I kept thinking about 
how we say the last word in some acronyms 
twice (like how we say PIN number when 
the N already stands for number) and how 
Jaden Smith in the Karate Kid remake wore 
a Detroit Lions shirt in China. This is not 
what everyone at school said sex was like. I 
was getting a participation trophy but batting 
.000 for the season.

“Rock You Like a Hurricane” — Scorpions
It was much more like a thunderstorm 

than a hurricane: inconvenient for everyone 
involved if you had other plans but not a 
complete waste of time if you need something 
to do.

I dropped her off back home and eventually 

just didn’t talk anymore. It’s not like we had 
“The Notebook” level of sexual intimacy and I 
am 99 percent confident neither of us would be 
writing home about our time together (I know 
it’s an expression but please don’t write home 
about your sexual encounters; I know I’m kind 
of doing it here, but I am far from a role model).

Though I’m not a perfect example, I’d make 

a bet that everyone’s first time was not some 
magical explosion of hormones and rainbows. 
If it was, lucky you — but also, does it really 
matter? Everyone figures it out eventually. No 
pressure.

BY MATT HARMON, DAILY STAFF REPORTER

ILLUSTRATION BY EMILY KOFFSKY