Romeo + Juliet

"And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss."

This continues my ongoing series on The Things I Have Learned From The Boys I Have Kissed. This particular installment is in recognition of a young man I lived with in Arizona, specifically Arcosanti. For those who don't know, Arcosanti is an experimental Arcology and failed attempt at ecological design paradigms. I moved to Phoenix in 2003, almost immediately after graduation, and then moved to Arcosanti in October.Over my three years at Arcosanti, I met a lot of people, with a constant influx of new population every five weeks, it was easy to meet new guys and have single-serving sexual partners that would disappear and never return. Until I met Murray.

Murray was pretty much made of magic. Not beautiful in the classical or traditional sense of the word, he set my soule on fire. He managed to fill me up with new thoughts and ideas. He challenged my pre-existing ideals and gave me somebody to confide in and fall in love with. Boy did I fall too. I crashed and burned. We shared some of the closest moments I've ever shared with another person. We would spend hours atop the ceramics apse, Crafts III building, and Vaults enjoying our lives and sharing whispers with each other.

During the day we would have passing conversations in the Office, and share meals in the Cafe. he would tail my tours, and I would give him pointers on his. At night, we would spend hours conversing via AIM and trade commentaries on livejournal and beyond. From time to time, we would bury ourselves in our friend Denman and spend the evening watching anime in her room while cracking wise, and making light of the universe as a whole, all the while respecting it.

Once, we committed acts of art and war at McDonald's all the while being pet by Denman, and egged on by others. We ate Swedish Fish, and drove a solar-powered golf-cart in the middle of the night. Sharing poetry in the Vaults, and at the mouths of caves in the middle of the desert, we practiced speaking our mind and not being a bitch.

He taught me something that no other boy had taught me before though. During all of our adventures, we never once kissed each other on the lips. In fact, we did little more than touch hands, and always in secret. We would sit together and interlink fingers, passing energy back and forth and sharing the heat we each produced. We would curl up in couches and fall asleep to the sounds of the desert. All in all, he showed me that love can be had without physical signs of such.

He taught me that sometimes, love takes the form of running a half-mile down the hill to camp at sunset, racing the moon to make sure that the boy you love more than life itself is calm, cool, collected and comfortable. We shared a closeness that I have found to echo in my continued friendships since my departure back to Omaha. Sometimes a kiss is overrated.