Tonight it was too hot to sleep with any clothes on (as usual), and so I slept naked. I woke up quite groggy, at around 7:30. This was not my final waking up; I was going to go back to sleep as soon as I got a drink of water from the kitchen. So , not thinking anything was amiss, I went to to kitchen to get a glass of water. As I was crossing the living room I heard a "Hmm hmm" from my flatmate.
I turned and saw him sitting there. Unfortunately, also sitting there were (from left to right): his mother, his mother's boyfriend and his sister. I smiled, said "hi", covered myself up, and went to put on some shorts.
As I re-went to the kitchen, his mother tried to comfort me by saying "Don't worry, I didn't see anything I hadn't seen before."
It was during puberty. It was a bit cold. I didn't even see any beautiful girls in bathing suits, but it happened nevertheless. All I was wearing was a small speedo, and suddenly, out of nowhere, as I was standing getting ready, I had an erection. About half of the school was there, watching. I tried to hide it, but it was just too obvious. And I stood there for about 20 seconds, trying to figure out what to do with myself. At last I realised that standing around hiding it would not do too much good, as everyone was already looking and pointing and laughing. So I rushed off to the toilets.
It still hasn't left me. Last week I ran into someone whom I hadn't seen in about 5 years, and the second thing he said (after "Hey, Seymore"), was "I hear there are polaroids of that swimming competition on the net."
Life can be so cruel.
My most embarrassing moment in life so far, happened a long time ago, on a visit to the German town of Hamelin (of Pied Piper fame). I don't know exactly how old I was, around 5 I think. We were living in Germany at the time and my parents thought it would be a fun day out.
We walked around, saw the sights. There was a stage play of the famous legend in the afternoon, In the town square if I remember correctly. There were hundreds of spectators hushed and gathered in the square as the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin played out on a distant stage.
Naturally, being a 5 year old, I soon lost interest in whatever the grown-ups were watching. I soon found something else to occupy my curiosity....
SPLASH!
Yes....somehow I had managed to fall into the water fountain located in the square, which my parents and I had been standing next to. Hundreds of heads turn my way as a small creature, not unlike a drowned rat is swiftly plucked from the fountain, proceeding to bawl like only a 5 year old can.
I was quickly transported back to the car and dried off, forcing my parents to miss the rest of the play, which had since resumed after the short distraction.
Although at the time I wasn't really old enough to understand the concept of embarrassment, I look back now and just cringe.
When I was 20 I was engaged to a young woman who was a year older than me. Over time, I decided that I wasn't really ready for the big "M" yet and broke off the engagement. She wasn't too happy about this, I should gather, but she took it in stride and we tried to eke out something close to an amicable friendship in the company of our other friends.
One night in February of '94, about two months after the break-up, we all (she, myself and some mutual friends) got together to play a Dungeons and Dragons game. Very fun and involved. We played for around 7 hours straight. As we stepped out into the cold, winter night to leave we realized, to our dread, that we'd been snowed in while in the throes of our role playing game. And I do mean snowed in. Three feet in the course of 7 hours. It was something none of us had expected.
Left with no way to leave the house, and thoroughly exhausted, we camped out there. Most of us had our own places to sleep- some couches, extra beds and whatnot. In the end, though, it turned out that two people would simply have to share a bed together. Since my ex-fiance and I had already shared a bed for 8 months, we saw no reason why we couldn't endure it for one more night. If we behaved ourselves, nothing could go wrong, right?
The next morning, well, "old habits die hard", as they say. It was morning, the bed was warm and so were we. In retrospect, it was nice and gentle and not at all uncomfortable. We talked about it afterwards and decided that, no, it didn't mean we were together again. It was just good sex.
A few weeks later, it was like a wall had come down between us. I'm talking "Iron Curtain". Whenever I walked into a room she was in, if others were in there, things would get real quiet and she would promptly leave. I had no clue what was wrong. Apparently my friends were under some sort of code of silence.
A month later, I was at work and got a call from my parents. "Come home as soon as you get off work," they told me in no uncertain terms. I was beginning to wonder who'd died. So... I make off for my parent's house, they escort me out to the pool and then tell me, "Son, you're a father. She's pregnant. One of your friends told us, since they couldn't tell you."
That has got to be the single most embarrassing thing I've ever had to experience. I mean, damn... that's the kind of news you break to your parents, not the other way around.
Incidentally, the baby didn't hold. Years later we (my ex-fiance and I) patched things up and became decent friends. My parents weren't vicious or snide about anything. But they were all kinds of disappointed, to be sure.
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