Rose Review - How Far Have You Gone?

Caterpillars know what’s up. Instead of enduring the public humiliation of puberty they build a tiny house around themselves and go through their awkward phase in private. Can you imagine how awesome that would be? Just like, “Peace y’allz, I’ll be chillin’ in this house for a couple years reading magazines, see ya when I’m gorgeous!”

But alas, no. We humans have to deal with adolescence slowly and painfully, in full view of everyone we know. Whether you had acne, braces, were too tall, too short, a ginger, a toehead, a nerd or a chubster, chances are something about you was fucked up. And the other kids had no problem reminding you.

Growing up, I was so skinny I could hide behind a churro. In general, most kids are skinny, but I was like Fiona-Apple-on-a-juice-cleanse skinny. If someone drew a stick figure, people would be like, “OMG, I know that girl, that’s Rose Surnow!” Boys called me “Somalia” and “Olive Oyl” and teased that they could snap me in two. The point is that middle school was a blast and puberty was easy and fun.

The smear campaign against my slight frame was hard enough on my ego, but the worst part was being flat-chested while everyone around me was “sprouting” (grossest word alert). All my friends were taking the fun train to tit city and I was like, “See you guys in ten years! I’m gonna enjoy looking like a cartoon for as long as possible.” The truth about being a teen is that you could have the personality of warm baba ganoush, but if you were stacked, you won. You were invited to the most exclusive sleepovers and endless dates with any short, high voiced boy in the land.

As a member of the have-nots, I was very stressed about my social position. I was humiliated by my bod and consequently was not doing anything sexy with it. Which brings us to the worst day of eighth grade. It was just another nightmare afternoon in middle school when Josh, the most popular boy in school, approached me at lunch. I was standing on the quad, waiting for my friends, when he walked straight toward me. I was confused. It was like one of those 1980s movies when the dork looks behind them and then points to themselves like, Me?

“Hey Rose.”

“Uh, hi Josh.”

“So, I was talking to my friends and we were wondering, how far have you gone?”

“Umm, I went to Michigan to visit my cousins last year.”

He clarified: “No, like, what base have you gone to?”

“That’s none of your business,” I said. Josh had obviously “gone” places; if rumours were true, all the way to third base. He was so cool. I didn’t want to admit that I had never kissed a boy, but what was I gonna say? I thought about my life and if anything sexual happened thus far. A couple things came to mind.

When my cousin and I were both six years old we engaged in some old-fashioned “horseplay” (don’t worry, no one was raped by Sandusky). We went into my bedroom, took off our undies, and then he stared at my vagina for a good ten seconds. Nothing else happened, but it was def intense. It would have gone on for longer, but my sister told on us. “Rose is doing something weird,” she told my dad. Cockblocker.

Then when I was eight years old, I was playing with my mentally disturbed neighbour, and again, I dropped trou. I don’t know why I was such a baby tramp but I just intuitively knew that hangouts were more fun when my vagina was out. Not only did my neighbour stare at my gineytown but he also made a fist and then gently placed it on top of my junk. It was like he was knocking on my crotch. It felt extremely dangerous and cool.

But I couldn’t tell Josh any of this. I couldn’t tell him that I was fisted by a crazy kid or that I hypnotised my cousin with my amazing vagina. It would make me sound too insane.

I was still reminiscing about my past when he asked again, “HELLO, anyone home? I said, HOW FAR HAVE YOU GONE?'”

“I’m not gonna tell you,” I responded. Perfect answer.

“OK fine, I’m gonna guess and you just say yes or no,” he said.

“Fine,” I reluctantly agreed.

“Have you french kissed?”

“No.”

“Have you been felt up?”

“No.” (Physically impossible)

“Have you been fingered?”

“No.”

“Have you had sex?”

“Nope.”

“Well, then you haven’t done anything! I named all the things.”

“No, you didn’t name ALL the things,” I said mysteriously and casually walked off. Checkmate.

I got out of the situation only by the hair of my nipples. Looking back on that day it blows my mind how naive we both were. Neither one of us could have dreamed that there are a million more bases than the standard four. Every day I learn something new about the human condition (via porn) on the internet. I wish I would have blown Josh’s mind and said something wild like, “I got fingered in my OTHER vagina.” That would have been really sweet. But I don’t think I could have handled being that popular.

@RoseSurnow