1. SEALED WITH A KISS

Riding on the handlebars of a bike for the first time was a little scary but I was thinking more about not getting caught by my mother than falling off. You see, I always got caught when I did something out of bounds. Leaving the public swimming pool, on a bike, with a boy, at 13.9 years old, in 1961, was definitely against every rule in my house.

Mike was my sorta, kinda boyfriend, my first boyfriend ever. I met him at a St. Bernadette’s church dance, where I went to meet cute boys. Catholic dances had the cutest ones, for sure, even for “that girl I’m going to convert someday”, as Father Doherty called me. Once Mike and me talked at the dance, he rode his bike to my house the last few weeks of school, his blue hat turned sideways as always, and we sat in the front grass avoiding the evil eye of my mother from the living room picture window. You see, I was not allowed to have boys in the house until I was in high school. Really dumb.

I tried to look just like Gidget, once I saw the movie, by tying my pigtails down over my ears with bows and flirting just like she did. Mike was kind of shy and I was kind of shy, too so I tried tipping my head down and looking up through my eyelashes, as I whispered “Oh Mike, really?” pouting a little bit, and I think it worked.

Beginning the first week of summer, Mike started coming to the pool every day with his best friend, Bill. He knew that I literally spent 15 hours every day at the pool, working in the kiddie pool in the morning, helping teach swimming until lunch and then laying out on my beach towel, coated in Coppertone Suntan lotion, all afternoon. The one-piece skirted swimsuits that girls like Gidget, in the movies, wore were out of this world. I pretended to be one of those girls on the beach, with all the boys. I had a bunch of new swimsuits every summer because my mother bought me a new one every time I ratted on my older sister. There were a few girls at the pool, the “wild” ones, who were wearing the new two-piece suits but there was no way my mother would let me wear one of those.

Mike always spread his towel right next to mine and leaned into me, just to tease me. I really liked him a lot because he had the coolest smile and the most radical blue eyes ever. I swore I would only marry someone with blue eyes someday! And, someday, I was going to kiss a boy! I practiced on the back of my hand sometimes, just to see what I thought it would feel like.

Bill spent his time trying to feel under girls’ swimsuits when they were in the water. He went to the Catholic school with Mike but none of that sanctity rubbed off on him. I stayed away from him but some of the others girls at the pool liked to take chances with those kind of boys.

My mother always told me that there were “nice girls” who went home and went to bed and there were “good time girls” that went to bed and went home and I had better be one of the nice ones. I really didn’t know what that meant but I thought it had something to do with necking.

Suzie, one of “Bill’s Girls”, leaned over our towels one afternoon. “C’mon over to my house. We can ride on the boys’ bikes. My parents aren’t home so we can chill.”

Mike and I looked at each other, he shrugged and I shrugged, Why not? So, I slipped my shorts and top over my swimsuit and climbed on the bar of Mike’s bike. It wasn’t easy or comfortable, even after watching Suzie jump on Bill’s bike. I tried to sit straight between the handlebars without touching Mike, which was not working. So, I leaned back against his chest, as Suzie did, which was the closest he and I had ever been. I really liked it when his arm rubbed against my bare leg while he pedaled after Bill.

Suzie used the key around her neck to open her front door. I climbed off the bike and stood nervously on the front porch as Mike set his bike on the lawn. We were looking at all the neighbors’ houses, wondering who knew us and would tell our parents, as everyone knew we weren’t supposed to be home alone. With boys! Both Bill and Suzie started laughing at us.

Obviously, she had done this before, as she grabbed Bill’s hand and led him back to her bedroom, flipping the switch on the stereo and shutting the bedroom door.

Oh boy, now what? Mike and I inched into the house, looking in all directions. We sat on the couch, close enough to touch but too nervous to actually hold hands. It was sure dark in that living room and my heart was thumping.

While about five songs played, I stayed on the couch while Mike stood up and checked out all the stuff on the mantle. Finally, he asked, “Do you wanna dance?”

We stood and shuffled together, my arms on his shoulders and his hands around my waist.

It was hard to keep shuffle dancing when one song was really fast and the next one was really slow. But, a little at a time, he started pulling me next to him and my cheek finally leaned against his shirt, just when his chin touched the top of my head. My heart was pounding so hard I could hardly breathe.

I looked up at him and he leaned down, his mouth coming close to mine. I sucked in my breath and sparks shot through my body…just as my nose hit his nose. Was this what happened when you kissed? We stopped, looked at each other, and tried again, this time turning our heads to the side a little bit. But turning our heads the same way didn’t work either and our noses still bumped together. Finally, he put his hand on my chin and I leaned my head one way to look at him and he turned his head the other way, just like in the movies. Ecstasy! I think we both jumped a little from the vibes running through our bodies. Really softly, we kissed some more to Brian Hyland’s song, “Sealed with a Kiss”. I was actually kissing a boy!

This was the most exciting and scary thing I had ever done! Just when I started to get more scared than excited, Bill wandered back into the living room and whistled for Suzie to get going. We climbed back on the bikes and I couldn’t stop smiling as that song played in my head all the way back to the pool.

Those words from the song, “I don’t wanna say goodbye…” made me look up at Mike when I climbed off his bike, feeling really shy and a little embarrassed. But he was smiling at me, a secret kind of smile, which made me feel so special. I knew then that nothing would ever be the same for me again.

I went inside the pool where Tom, the pool manager asked, “Where have you been? I have a private lesson and I need you to help.”

I stuttered something about walking around, took off my shorts and top and ran onto the pool deck. I knew I looked really different and was sure Tom could tell that I has actually been kissed…a bunch of times! And, well, there it was. My mother would find out for sure.

Miraculously, she never did.

I saw Mike a few more times before the end of the summer and, just like the song, it was really sad because he was going to a Catholic high school and I was going to the public high school in the fall so we hardly saw each other again. We never talked about our kisses, and we never got a chance to kiss again, but that song, “Sealed With A Kiss” transforms me back to that time in his arms, his lips on mine, and that secret smile. My first kiss -- his first one too -- and those eight kisses are forever sealed in my heart.

Many years later, I was watching my son’s baseball game and chatting with the people around me. We were playing St Bernadette’s and memories flooded back to the times I watched Mike play for that team during that wonderful summer.

“Which one is your son?” the woman next to me asked.

“David. He’s playing second base.” I pointed out my son and she smiled. “Which one is yours?”

“Mikey, the one with the blue hat turned to the side.” She pointed to a boy standing at the entrance to the dugout.

“He always wears it that way because his dad wears his hat that way.” She pointed to the man standing outside the dugout, his back to me.

“That’s my husband, Mike Riede.”

My heart fluttered wildly and the song, “Sealed With A Kiss”, suddenly flooded my brain.

SEALED WITH A KISS

Riding on the handlebars of a bike for the first time was a little scary, but I was thinking more about not getting caught by my mother than falling off. You see, I always got caught when I did something out of bounds. Leaving the public swimming pool, on a bike, with a boy, at 13.9 years old, was definitely against every rule in my house.

Mike was my sorta, kinda boyfriend, my first boyfriend ever. I met him at a St. Bernadette’s church dance, where I went to meet cute boys. Catholic dances had the cutest ones, for sure, even for “that girl I’m going to convert someday,” as Father Doherty called me. Once Mike and I talked at the dance, he rode his bike to my house the last few weeks of school and we sat in the front grass, avoiding the evil eye of my mother from the living room picture window. You see, I was not allowed to have boys in the house until I was in high school. Really dumb.

I tried to look just like Gidget, once I saw the movie, by tying my pigtails down over my years with bows and flirting just like she did. Mike was kind of shy and I was kind of shy, too, so I tried tipping my head down and looking up through my eyelashes, pouting a little bit, as I whispered “Oh Mike, really?” pouting a little bit, and I think it worked.

Beginning the first week of summer, Mike started coming to the pool every day with his best friend, Bill. He knew that I literally spent 15 hours every day at the pool, working in the kiddie pool in the morning, helping teach swimming until lunch and then laying out on my beach towel, coated in Coppertone Suntan lotion, all afternoon. The one-piece skirted swimsuits that Gidget wore were out of this world. One thing I could always count on was having lots of those swimsuits because my mother bought me a new one every time I ratted on my older sister. There were a few girls at the pool, the “wild” ones, who were wearing the new two-piece suits but there was no way my mother would let me wear one of those.

Mike always spread his towel right next to mine and leaned into me, just to tease me. I really liked him a lot because he had the coolest smile and the most radical blue eyes ever. I swore I would only marry someone with blue eyes someday! And, someday, I was going to kiss a boy! I practiced on the back of my hand sometimes, just to see what I thought it would feel like.

Bill spent his time trying to feel under girls’ swimsuits when they were in the water. He went to the Catholic school with Mike but none of that sanctity rubbed off on him. I stayed away from him but some of the others girls at the pool liked to take chances with those kind of boys. My mother always told me that there were “nice girls” who went home and went to bed and there were “good time girls” that went to bed and went home and I had better be one of the nice ones. I really didn’t know what that meant but I thought it had something to do with “necking.”

Suzie, one of “Bill’s Girls,” leaned over our towels one afternoon.

“C’mon over to my house,” she said. “We can ride on the boys’ bikes. My parents aren’t home so we can chill.”

Mike and I looked at each other and he shrugged and I shrugged. Why not? I slipped my shorts and top over my swimsuit and climbed on the bar of Mike’s bike. It wasn’t easy or comfortable, even after watching Suzie jump on Bill’s bike. I tried to sit straight between the handlebars without touching Mike, which was not working. So, I leaned back against his chest, as Suzie did, which was the closest he and I had ever been. I really liked it when his arm rubbed against my bare leg while he pedaled after Bill.

Suzie used the key around her neck to open her front door. I climbed off the and stood nervously on the front porch as Mike set his bike on the lawn. We were looking at all the neighbors’ houses, wondering who knew us and would tell our parents, as everyone knew we weren’t supposed to be home alone… with boys! Both Bill and Suzie started laughing at us. Obviously, she had done this before, as she grabbed Bill’s hand and led him back to her bedroom, flipped the switch on the stereo and shut the bedroom door.

Oh boy, now what? Mike and I inched into the house, looking in all directions. We sat on the couch, close enough to touch but too nervous to actually hold hands. It was sure dark in that living room and my heart was thumping.

While about five songs played, I stayed on the couch while Mike stood up and checked out all the stuff on the mantle. Finally, he asked… “Do you wanna dance?”

We stood and shuffled together, my arms on his shoulders and his hands around my waist. It was hard to keep shuffle dancing when one song was really fast and the next one was really slow. But, a little at a time, he started pulling me next to him and my cheek finally leaned against his shirt, just when his chin touched the top of my head. My heart was pounding so hard I could hardly breathe.

I looked up at him and he leaned down, his mouth coming close to mine. I sucked in my breath and sparks shot through my body... just as my nose hit his nose. Was this what happened when you kissed? We stopped, looked at each other, and tried again, this time turning our heads to the side a little bit. But turning our heads the same way didn’t work either and our noses still bumped together. Finally, he put his hand on my chin and I leaned my head one way to look at him and he turned his head the other way, just like in the movies. Ecstasy! I think we both jumped a little from the vibes running through our bodies. Really softly, we kissed some more to Brian Hyland’s song, “Sealed with a Kiss.” I was actually kissing a boy!

This was the most exciting and scary thing I had ever done! Just when I started to get more scared than excited, Bill wandered back into the living room and whistled for Suzie to get going. We climbed back on the bikes and I couldn’t stop smiling as that song played in my head all the way back to the pool.

Those words from the song, “I don’t wanna say goodbye...” made me look up at Mike when I climbed off his bike, feeling really shy and a little embarrassed. But he was smiling at me, a secret kind of smile, which made me feel so special. I knew then that nothing would ever be the same for me again.

I went inside the pool where Tom, the pool manager asked: “Where have you been? I have a private lesson and I need you to help.”

I stuttered something about walking around, I guess, took off my shorts and top and ran onto the pool deck. I knew I looked really different and was sure Tom could tell that I had actually been kissed... a bunch of times! And, well, there it was. My mother would find out for sure. Miraculously, she never did.

I saw Mike a few more times before the end of the summer and, just like the song, it was really sad because he was going to a Catholic high school and I was going to the public high school in the fall so we hardly saw each other again. We never talked about our kisses, and we never got a chance to kiss again, but that song, “Sealed With A Kiss,” would always take me back to that time in his arms, his lips on mine, and that secret smile. My first kiss -- his first one too – and those eight kisses are forever sealed in my heart.

Many years later, I was watching my son’s baseball game and chatting with the people around me. We were playing St Bernadette’s and memories flooded back to the times when I watched Mike play for that team during that wonderful summer.

“Which one is your son?” the woman next to me asked.

“David. He’s playing second base.” I pointed out my son and she smiled.

“Which one is yours?”

“Mikey, the one with the blue hat turned to the side.” She pointed to a boy standing at the entrance to the dugout.

“He always wears it that way because his dad wears his hat that way.” She pointed to the man standing outside the dugout, his back to me.

“That’s my husband, Mike Riede.”

My heart fluttered wildly and the song, “Sealed With A Kiss,” suddenly flooded my brain.