Bussing Problems

Winter of '82

So many things have changed since this was written in the winter of ’82.  Not only is Johnny Carson no longer on television, he’s departed for that big late night talk show in the sky.  The Colorado Rockies mentioned in the article were a hockey team that is now the New Jersey Nets.  The baseball team of the same name came over a decade later.  And the Edmonton Eskimos, that’s just a mistake.  The Edmonton hockey team is, of course, the Oilers, while the Eskimos are the Edmonton CFL football team.  But the kissing problem, the do you kiss, don’t you kiss and why do you kiss a female you’re neither married or related to, continues unabated. 

Antisocial, character deficiency, or up tight.  Whatever the reason, I am unable to cope with the ‘huggy-kissy” lifestyle prevalent in today’s society. 

For anyone growing up in the Midwest a couple of decades past, it was okay to kiss girls.  But if they weren’t relatives, a person at least presented them with a class ring or a fraternity pin prior to planting one on them.  But placing a big, juicy, smooch on the cheek of every Tom, Dick and Muffy is just beyond me. 

Who hasn’t witnessed the following scene on television?  Johnny Carson introduces his next guest, a curvaceous young starlet who strolls through the curtain to audience applause.  Her face bears a luminescent smile that would gladden the heart of any toothpaste manufacturer.  As she heads for her seat, next to Ed and the host’s desk, our starlet pauses to embrace Johnny before sitting down.  The, after the applause dies down, Johnny initiates the conversation by admitting, “It’s nice that you and I have finally had a chance to meet.  I’ve heard so much about you.” 

Now that’s just embarrassing, event to a viewer who doesn’t know either person and is watching the show 1,500 miles from the studio.  They confess to having never met and yet have just carried on like a GI greeting his wife after three years of dodging death on the beaches and atolls of the South Pacific. 

Hockey players are no better.  A little hugging of teammates and an occasional “high five” are all right if, after a long season, the team has just captured the Stanley Cup and earned the distinction of being the pre-eminent club in all of professional hockey.  But the other night on television the Colorado Rockies, who have trouble licking the roof of their mouth let alone another hockey team, were trailing the Edmonton Eskimos 5-0 late in the final period.  Suddenly, miracle of miracles, a Rockie scored.  I’ve never seen such hugging and squeezing in all my life.  A person just tuning in could have suffered the misconception the goal actually mattered.  Why my teammates didn’t get that emotional with their girl friends when Cambridge squeaked past Orion for the Cornbelt Conference basketball championship in 1957, let alone carry on with each other.  And I had always been told hockey was a he-man sport. 

Soccer players are even worse.  While watching “Soccer from Germany” last Saturday on the educational station, Düsseldorf suddenly scored on the Hamburg side after trailing most of the match, “one goal to nil.”  What happened next was unbelievable.  I haven’t seen such carrying on between members of the same sex since I stumbled into the wrong San Francisco bar in 1973.  Whatever happened to the Teutonic reserve that has always been associated with the German people? 

Kissy-kissy, huggy-huggy, seems to have started on the East Coast.  But Easterners are at least a little discriminatory in who they buss.  Decorum demands they only nuzzle peers with cut nicknames like Miffy, Pudge, Tush, or Whee.  Etiquette also allows Eastern liberals to brush the cheek of anyone without a nickname as long as the receiver has a paid up Junior League membership.  They are, under no circumstances, allowed to kiss people with dirty fingernails, anyone with a last name ending in a vowel other than E, or social contacts speaking with an “Ahmo” dialect, as in “Ah mo kick yo’ butt.” 

Californians, on the other hand, kiss anybody they’ve ever seen at least once before in their life, including the Avon lady, the supermarket checkout girl, or Mr. Good Wrench.  One would think the Golden State was attempting to wrest the kissing championship away from the East Coast. 

Now it’s happening right here in Grand Junction.  All my friends are emulating the beautiful people of Aspen.  Going to a cocktail party is like high school date night all over again.  Should I or shouldn’t I?  I’m concerned about alienating acquaintances, but, on the other hand, I’m not real keen on transmitting communicable diseases either. 

Plus, there’s always that impossible decision on whether to aim for the lips or the cheek.  I always get the signals mixed up.  Last weekend, after five nights of lying awake and mulling it over, I screwed up my courage and attempted to smooch a party hostess on her cheek.  Sure enough, she was thinking lips.  I nailed her right in the nose.