Kiss On

I have a book in me. It is about the kiss. You know, “The Kiss”. The kiss by which all others are measured. It is that magic kiss that haunts memory.

I have researched this. I have asked random strangers if there is a kiss that they have never forgot. Each time they stop in their tracks, get a look that says they have reawakened to a dream memory.

Often when asked they share the memory with me. We then dwell in the same magic kingdom of memorable kisses.

I have had a few kisses that keep the bar high.

In my marketing of self on dating sites one of my trolling quotes was, “Kisses are underrated.” This has served me well. It weeds out the bad kissers and attracts those who want to pick up the gauntlet.

Kisses bemuse me; my enchantment with them does not fade.

And then comes Georgia! My Georgia kisses could get their own chapter. Kiss upon kiss. Each kiss endearing.

I have been here less than two months yet can fill pages of the kiss anthology.

The school janitor kisses me on the hand each day when I arrive at school. One of the schoolgirls kissed the sparkly pencil I gave it to her. A police officer that looked like he was sent to liven up a middle age babe’s birthday party blew me a kiss as I walked down the street in Tbilisi. (Not since my teen’s baby!).

A toddler just threw a bunch of smackaroos across the room a la Georgian style with his little curled lip. The village babbias when they discover I am here to teach English pucker up and hit both cheeks with an extra soft kisses that only the toothless can give.

Kisses and more kisses. Sweet kisses, dream kisses. Kisses that just open up some love portal in me. Kisses that mend some neglect that I confused as carnal.

Kisses that call unspent tears.

Best of show, makes a chapter in the book was the one my host mom gave me. I had retreated to bed. All snugged in, I was spent from too many new noises, names, foods, sounds. Empty, my energy spent from navigating the foreign, longing for the familiar. She just opened my bedroom door, stepped over to my bed, and kissed me goodnight. She smiled, all rosy and stepped out. And I missed my mom, and my dad and the thousand kisses I had given my own darlings before they slumbered off. And I rolled up into the little womb ball the takes me to dreamland, all sweet. Sweet like I was before any kiss had tarnish. Ah Georgia.