when I was one of the X-Men

{photo via pinterest}

we were given lessons in how to touch. I wouldn't think it was real unless I had experienced it myself, first hand, sitting shoulder to shoulder and toe to back with my peers. there were big smiles as they demonstrated on the stage, one boy and one girl.

always from the side. never from the front. girls have breasts. don't cause a brother to stumble. arms around the shoulder, quick squeeze. 

we called it "nacho"-ing, a playful turn of phrase coined from the lauding of the "non-committal side hug." we were being taught how to stay pure. we were being taught how to protect our brothers from stumbling, from being ruled by that strange thing behind the zipper of their jeans. we were proud of ourselves.

my body was dangerous. I had to be careful. we all knew that. we were dangerous beings, with our shapely hips and our growing breasts that might press into a boy's chest and send impure thoughts racing though him like poison.

I was one of the X-Men. my name was Rogue. to touch me was to die.

because I was a girl. and girls were poison, except to our one-day husbands.

I'm going to let you in on a secret. it didn't protect me. it did the exact opposite. 

it taught me that I was dangerous. it taught me that my body was a cactus. all I could do was hurt, all I could was destroy. it taught me to hate me.

this same dangerous theology creeps through the ranks of the youth groups and the purity conventions. raps and songs and t-shirts and seminars abound. we grip the hearts of those girls, sitting shoulder to shoulder and toe to back with their peers, and whisper, you are in charge of his mind. you are in charge of protection. you are the problem. 

who put us in charge of stripping them down until they keep their arms crossed across their chests and their heads down with shoulders bent to hide that they are women, God-made and Heaven-adored? where is the mandate to shake the least of these, the little ones, until all their worth comes dropping out the bottom like gold doubloons down the storm-drain?

we are resisting innocence in our chase for purity. we are hanging stones instead of breaking them to gravel.

I remember the first time I hugged the man that would become my husband. I mean, really hugged him. I had just returned from a summer in South America, long weeks of sleepless nights and experiences that filled me with wonder. and there was my boyfriend, standing on the curb beside my parents' van, smiling. I didn't think. I hugged him, hard. from the front. and I can promise  you this :: the thoughts in our head were not about breasts or penises or sex or impurity or stumbling blocks.

we were embracing.
that was all.