Youth Conference

One of the earliest encounters of just how strange the opposite gender could be to my limited adolescent comprehension has got to be my experience attending a LDS “Youth Conference” when I was about 15-16 years old.  This was an organized outing with kids in the 14-18 age range on church property near Cle Elum.  There were games, food, dancing, and various religious related workshops/classes to attend.  I was a very socially awkward youth, especially during the age of 16 when one reached the magical age where dating was no longer scornfully prohibited, and suddenly encouraged.

For me, girls were still extremely difficult to approach with all the social, religious, and physical taboos that a youth that age had to deal with.  I didn’t have terribly supportive friends at that age, and was partially a loner for periods of time.  At this conference I remember playing some field games like football, Frisbee, or volleyball.  They rang out a dinner call that evening and everyone surged towards the mess hall to stand in line.  Due to some confusion or organization of the line, I got pushed to near the very back.  By the time I reached the food, it was mostly picked over, and very little remained of a garlic chicken and rice dish.  I was given a rapidly cooling slice of chicken breast, some peas, and a large scoop of a soupy rice mixture that smelled heavily of garlic.  I made a joke to someone in line that they were feeding us garlic to thwart any temptation to kiss during the dance later that evening.  At the first bite, I nearly gagged due to the concentration of garlic, which I normally enjoy moderate portions of.   Upon closer inspection, the rice dish had maybe 1% rice grains, and 99% sliced cloves of raw garlic.  I got the last dregs of the pan, where all the white fluffy grains of rice were consumed, and only the dense clove fragments remained, polluting my meal.  Oh well.  It was soon time for the dance.

I actually was looking forward to going to one of my first dances.  One of the few instances where it was socially permissible to actually touch another girl, and making it slightly easier to break down awkward taboo barriers.  This is where I met Amanda.  Sheepishly, I asked a few girls to dance when a few slow songs came around.  I got rejected a few times, but more often the girl would reluctantly accept, avoid eye contact, and during several occurrences would pull their sleeves down to help sop up my nervous profusely sweaty palms.  Conversation during most dances were difficult due to the music volume and dim lighting making reading lips challenging.  After only about an hour into the dance, my self esteem and confidence had been shattered.  I retreated to a dark section near the wall, away from people.  It was there when I spotted Amanda, also seeming to be hiding in the shadows.

Something about how she stood there made me feel slightly more comfortable, so I cautiously approached.  She looked to be having a rough evening.  A bit younger than me, surprisingly cute and petite, but looked like she had recently been crying.  I awkwardly struggled in conversation that didn’t go anywhere, but was saved when a slow song started, and I asked her if she wanted to dance. She surprisingly accepted, and shortly into our dance, I felt her muscles noticeably relax and she pulled me close to her.  I could hear her muffled speech about how her parents recently passed away, and she didn’t have many friends here.  In her venting, she continued pulling me closer.  At the most inappropriate time, my awkward physical body reacted to such a foreign close embrace with a cute girl during the dance.  The more I tried to pull away, the more her voice wavered and the harder she held onto me.  Eventually it became pointless, she was going to notice something was different sooner or later, and I nearly had a panic attack with the clash of social and emotional extremes.

It came to a point where there was no way she didn't notice.  Then to my utter amazement, I could tell she did notice, but she didn’t even skip a beat.  Her dancing became slightly more provocative which only exacerbated the situation.  There was no ambiguity at this point.  I didn’t know what was going on.  One minute this seemingly innocent girl was near tears and opening up to deep emotional wounds, and the other minute she’s acting extremely frisky.  Unfortunately, I was so worried about being spotted “dancing inappropriately”, I wasn’t in the right mind to enjoy such an unexpected experience.  Plus pulling the girl away from me might trigger rejection and cascade into a complete emotional breakdown for her.  I was trapped! 

Eventually the song ended, and I was caught up in the dizzying highs of stimulation and confusion of what was going on with Amanda.  We talked more out in the shadows and away from everyone.  The more she talked the more comfortable and flirtatious she became.  Later another slow song started up, and she grabbed my hand, pulled me onto the dance floor, and immediately resumed where we had left off!  I had just started to shrug off my overwhelming concerns about the situation, and was about to begin enjoying myself, until I spotted my mother in the distance!  Yes, my mother was there at this youth conference as one of the chaperones.  She probably didn’t intend to be staring at me, but she was.  By each passing turn during the dance I could see her glare of disapproval.  The remainder of the dance was spent trying to avoid a line of sight to my mother, and to find a place outside of peering authoritative eyes.  At the conclusion, to avoid any encounter with my mom, I pulled Amanda outside, which might have been mistaken as some spontaneous romantic gesture, but I was in total emotional disarray.   Amanda told me the following day that she thought we were going to go into the woods and make out, but instead that evening we simply parted ways.

The next day there were several church related lectures and classes that the youth were herded into.  We were divided into groups, and would rotate into different classrooms.  I can’t remember if Amanda was assigned to my particular group, or if she had found and joined mine.  Every single lecture seemed to stem around the evils of physical contact between genders in their youth.  One particular class, a speaker was focusing specifically upon the law of chastity.  It was during this already painfully awkward lecture, Amanda chose this time to begin touching me during the talk.  She started subtle at first, touching my arm and holding my hand.  This was highly unusual behavior during a talk setting.  Even the mere eye contact with the opposite gender felt grossly inappropriate given the topic.  As the topics in the lecture intensified in explicit detail, Amanda abandoned the subtle route.  Her hands wandered under my shirt, up my back, and toyed at my waistband.  This was becoming too much for me, and I tried to pull her hand away.  The commotion attracted the attention of the church leader who was giving the lecture, as well as several of my peers.  I was able to thwart her attempts a few times, but she kept at it.  I tried to hold her hand tightly to prevent her from grabbing my body any further by trapping it with a clenched hand.  In response, she used her other hand to pry, and nearly broke one of my fingers as she levered it.

Suddenly she started trying to play some game where she was intentionally trying to inflict as much pain as possible.  Pinching, pulling fingers backwards, etc.  What was going on?!  While in a crescendo of trying to battle this crazed girl away from me, fending off physical advances, and trying not to cause too much of a disturbance with the rest of my classmates, she abruptly reached over and grabbed my crotch in clear sight of everyone around.  My body was already in an excited state due to her unwanted physical contact, and that last action caused a clashing surge of unexpected overpowering stimulation and horrible awkwardness.  It was too much for my body to handle apparently.  My nose suddenly became a geyser of blood.  I was extremely prone to nosebleeds in my childhood and youth.  The increase of blood pressure and stress reached the popping point of the thin cellular membrane of my nasal cavity and the artery that passes nearby.  I think most of the class was already distracted with my squirming, and now had me to focus their entire attention on as I excused myself, clutching my gushing nose and doing my best to walk down closely seated isle way trying to conceal an obvious erection.  All while dozens of kids watched me leave during a lecture about chastity.  It was beyond humiliating and embarrassing. 

I don’t remember much after that and it all blurs away into trivial details.  My memory clips much of the rest, or it seems to have withered away, being outshone by such closer traumatic memories.  Amanda gradually lost interest after I pulled away, and thankfully didn’t seem to be all that broken up about our little fling. 

Many many years later, I ran into Amanda at the mall.  I had to be told it was her by a friend.  She had zero physical resemblance to the girl I encountered that horrific weekend.  She appeared as though she had aged 10 years older than me, and looked like she had gone through some rough miles.  She was in poor physical condition, and had a few hollering kids of multiple ethnicities.  I felt so sorry for her.