Dear 18-Year-Old Self,
You bubble with independence and are surrounded by a campus of like-minded individuals in a sea of Milwaukee’s Best. College has made you a solemn promise since day one of freshman year, that every Thirsty Thursday, Fucked-up Friday, and Sloppy Saturday, you will have opportunities to meet life-long friends get laid. You’ll feel like a kid in a candy store on some of your nights out, and there will be times when you score, but let me first warn you of a few things you should never do in the bedroom.
You’ll have a friends-with-benefits thing going on with this girl from Physics class. Shocking, I know. One night, she’ll text you, come over, and you’ll go at it on your roommate’s bed because of some weird location fetish. As you climax, you’ll throw your head back and unleash a guttural yell: “YES… OH GOD MILA KUNIS!” This is when she leaves, but as timing would have it, as she’s walking out your door, your roommate walks in and finds you under his covers, naked, crying, and unsatisfied. This will be the first of many roommate contract violations.
At another party, a different girl comes up to you. You start talking and bring her back to your room. To avoid another awkward roommate situation, the action moves to your bed. She asks you to put some music on, so you choose R.Kelly’s “Bump and Grind.” Though you failed a Spanish vocab quiz earlier that week, you drunkenly remember every word to the song, and in that moment, you were infinite. You were R. Kelly—mere seconds from pissing on her (kidding)—soulfully screaming at this girl’s face, spraying her with saliva. She asks you to stop singing, but no, that’s not how this works. R. Kelly’s sweet, sultry voice melts into your off-key monotone cries in what could be the dopest collaboration this side of Rebecca Black and the random black guy from the Friday video. As the night goes on, you sing along to “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,” the Korean parts of “Gangnam Style,” and Beethoven’s 9th Symphony (I don’t even know). She won’t call back.
In general, you probably feel like the dirty things you say, as you very poorly lay it down, help your partner get hot and bothered. No. I’m not even going to point out a specific instance, because you do this every single time. You’re already awkward in normal conversations. What makes you think you’re going to turn into a suave sex-talking god as soon as you’re going balls deep? When you’re in bed, you’re like watching the really scrawny guy incorrectly using a machine at the gym. It’s cute that you’re putting in so much effort and grunting at the insignificant weight you’re pushing, but in the end, nobody is impressed. The next time you have the urge to say something like, “Gurl, I know you love this dope dick,” don’t.
I know that your every breath must be accompanied by searching your phone for a text, wall post, tweet, or email, but you should not take those bad habits into the bedroom. Let’s just say, hypothetically, you’re with your girlfriend and in the heat of the moment you hear a ding. Did your phone go off, or did you just get a bad idea? Then, hypothetically, you find yourself slowly inching towards the bedside table, saying, “Can you move that way? I want to show you something.” Your girlfriend hopes you learned a new position, and maybe you did, and maybe it’s from Cosmo, which you may or may not have started reading, because you may or may not find it intellectually stimulating. At this point, hypothetically, you’re within arms-reach of the phone and decide to go for it. Instead, you fall off the bed, bringing your partner down with you. Luckily, her head hits the bedside table and slows her down, but your impact shake the floor so viciously, your phone falls off the table. Hypothetically, your partner has a bleeding head, needs 10 stitches, and has a very serious concussion. You, hypothetically, have a ruptured disc, blue balls, and no text message. I’m not saying this happens to you, but I’m not saying it doesn’t either.
At this point, your sex life looks like a B-horror film, but I’ll leave you with one more lesson. You love quoting movies as part of “humorous” and “witty” conversation. Don’t worry, this is fine. What’s not fine is quoting movies while laying down pipe. What’s sexy about shouting, “SHOW ME THE MONEY!” right when you’re about to bust? It just makes things weird, and, at worst, she’ll laugh at you. Do you know how emasculating it is to be laughed at by a girl when you’re naked? Don’t answer that. So please don’t ever say, “Houston, we have a problem,” when you’re fumbling with your Trojan, or “THIS IS SPARTA!” right before you first penetrate, or “I’ll be back,” in your crappy Schwarzenegger voice after you finish.
You’re probably feeling down on yourself and are considering just being abstinent during college because it’s not looking so good. Remember, though, that it’s a learning curve. You’re going to make mistakes in the beginning and have awkward moments in the bedroom, but that’s how you learn and get better at it. Be smart about your actions, care about her wants in bed, and please always use a condom. If you have a kid now, future-you (me) will pay the price. And trust me, kid, you’ll be able to please a woman soon enough. It may or may not hit you until you’re 65, but until then try to have some fun!
Sincerely,
Your 65-Year-Old Self
– NO ’16. Illustrated by MG ’15.