I had been using the term “hookup” wrong for virtually all of my teenage years, and I only realized it in my first semester of college.
I like to consider myself a self-proclaimed “innocent girl.” Sure, I’ve had four boyfriends since ninth grade, and I’m very happy in my long-term relationship now, but I never had anyone to set an example for me. I was the oldest girl in my family, which meant no older sisters or cousins to talk to. Asking your 26-year-old brother for relationship advice isn’t exactly appealing.
As for my friends, they had mostly been participating in my definition of “hookup culture”: simply just making out with people. That’s right – I thought that my friends who were not in relationships were only making out with randos at parties. The idea that people would use “hookup” to refer to sex, or just anything beyond first base, was foreign to me.
I was under the assumption all of high school that hooking up with someone meant a clandestine makeout under the bleachers at the football field. I was so excited in 11th grade after I had my first “real hookup.” I thought I was doing something cool and exciting by sneaking away from a homecoming party to go kiss a guy in the street.
My lovely boyfriend Patrick informed me that I had been very, very wrong.
I began asking all of my friends how they defined “hookup,” including my best friend from high school, who just got into her first long-term relationship this summer. We were quite literally the definition of hookup culture vs. dating culture. Somehow, everyone else around me knew that hooking up with someone meant more than just making out.
Where did I experience this misunderstanding that I was wrong compared to literally everyone else? I thought back to all my peers from high school and college who told me about their hookups, and the realizations started clicking for me: people can just have sex if they want to.
My own experiences with dating, relationships and sex unfortunately gave me a superiority complex in the world of hookups. I thought I was better than other people because I wasn’t making out with random guys at bars or parties, but I wasn’t even thinking correctly.
Did the people around me assume that I knew what a hookup meant, or did they just want to keep the “innocent girl” shielded from reality?
I have now learned to just always ask what people mean when they say “hookup.” Maybe someone else felt just as sheltered and hidden as I did, assuming that hookups were something a little cheeky and fun.
I support all of my friends and peers, whether they have their significant other wrapped around their finger or live for a situationship or one-night stand. But just don’t be surprised if I ask you to clarify with me exactly what happened when you went home with that guy from a party.
