I took my son, Gabriel (12), to his first bar mitsvah yesterday. Hell, it might have been my first bar mitsvah also. I wasn’t so popular at the Jewish Center as a kid. Mostly because I was the basketball coach’s pet and shot the ball too much. So many regrets. So many 25 foot jumpshots.

Any way, I secretly hoped that Gabriel might be inspired by the bar mitsvah and want to be bar mitsvah’d himself. He seemed seduced by the presents and gifts of money…my all American boy.

Gabriel has already gone through 5 years of private Mandarin Chinese lessons so how hard could it be to pick up Hebrew in his spare time?

Hebrew is nothing more than a complicated and completely different alphabet from both English and Chinese with a wholly and holy different phonetic structure. As a Father that can’t spell “persimmon” in English without “spell check”, I don’t think that it is too much of me to expect my son to learn a third tremendously difficult language.

And I haven’t been bar mitsvah’d yet myself…who better to make up for my slacker existence than my Son. Look what Jesus did for his Dad?

Heck, now that I think about it, it may be imperative to Gabriel’s functioning as an adult that he become a fully accredited and recognized by a community of Jews. Do I really want him to turn out like me? A wishy-washy lover of all religions. A man as happy at a church, temple or mosque as I am at a shul? “Religion is not a Pu-Pu Platter from which you get to choose 3 items.” I was once told. I believe I was told this by myself. I quickly ignored the advice and went to a B’hai Temple.

Still, it would be nice to see Gabriel get a bar mitsvah. Much like it will be nice to see Gabriel marry one day but then again, it’s fine if I never see either. Although based on what I learned last night, the “shotgun marriage” may be what I see first.

At the evenings dinner event, a parent told me that she knew all about Gabriel’s much younger girlfriend, Lisa. (Lisa is in fifth grade and Gabriel is in sixth.) They became “boyfriend and girlfriend” almost 4 years when Lisa wrote Gabriel the sweetest 3 line love letter that I have ever seen. It said
“Dear Gabriel,
I love you.
Lisa”.

There was no further explanation. Simply “I love you.”. No asking if she was loved in return? Just a simple proclamation. I’ve often thought that if I ever write a love letter again, I will steal the form and pretend it is a boilerplate. “Dear Condaleeza, I love you. Michael.”

The parent then asked me “Do you know if Gabriel has gotten his first kiss?”. Immediately I responded, “I don’t think so.” I simply assumed that having a girlfriend in second grade is very much a non-kissing relationship much like I assumed that couples that marry in their 80’s are involved in non-sexual relationships. At that age you are far too tired to put up the necessary dungeon and chains paraphernalia.

The parent asked “Are you sure?”

And of course I was not sure.

I based his non-kissing on the pattern long established by his Father. My first romantic kiss did not come until I was in 11th grade. Although I was kissed quite a bit before “on a dare”. As I recall, I was also touched by a lot of ten foot poles. And in a terrible incident in a boys locker, I was touched by a 6 foot Pole. (I crushed his kneecap with a kick.)

So, this parent had piqued my curiosity and much like getting water, I decided later that night to go direct to the source.

Driving home, I asked Gabriel “Have you ever kissed a girl?”.

He shook his head slowly side to side, as if I was a moron and said “Yes”. It was as if I had asked the most inane question like “Gabriel, Have you ever used oxygen?”.

I said “Really? When?”

“A bunch of times.”, Gabriel responded.

“Wow.”, I said impressed by his love of the ladies and vice versa. “Who?”, I asked.

Gabriel said “Well, Lisa for one. She’s my girlfriend.”.

I was a bit dumbstruck. I assumed it was a chase and board game based relationship, not the germ and saliva sharing kind.

“So, you just went and kissed her one day and she kissed you back?, I queried.”.

“No, Dad. You never just kiss a girl, you wait until you are sure that they want to be kissed.”, Gabriel explained.

I was thinking “Well, he is a little like his Father.”.

“How can you tell that a girl wants you to kiss her?”, I asked Gabriel. Genuinely wanting to know for MY education.

He said “Well, she’ll give you signs. Like Lisa. She said something in her room, all slow, like ‘We’ve known each other a long time…’ then she leaned toward me, closed her eyes and puckered her lips.”

And I thought that’s a pretty good sign.

Although in the case of Gabriel’s Mother, I must admit, after many, many times in my company, she finally said to me “Are you ever going to kiss me?”. I took it as a sign that it was alright to kiss her. And three or four kisses later, we had Gabriel. (I’m a very good kisser.)

I asked Gabriel who “else” he had kissed. He told me that he had kissed girls named Liza and Beth in different years. And two girls had chased him at recess last year and both tried to kiss him. Neither succeeded. Because my boy is no whore.

I asked Gabriel who was the best kisser. He said “They were all nice.”. Quite impressive. It appears that the boy doesn’t kiss and tell. And I never told him that.

So, without my ever wondering before, I do know that Gabriel kisses.

I’ll just have to wait and see about the bar mitsvah. Although from what I gather, he is rapidly becoming a man with or without the consent of Judaism.

I wish that I weren’t so proud but “Way to go, Son!”. I always supposed that success with ladies skips a generation. Now, I know.

Kiss away my handsome blue eyed boy.