What is sex these days?

Just had another birthday. I’m rather accomplished chronologically. But not in other ways. I’ve never figured out what sex is. Has anyone? In the last few years there’s been a proliferation not only of “porn,” but of approaches to it; an expansion of “permissiveness” and appeals to its normalcy and desirability. There’s a whole new “normal.” And I thought I was a rebel, losing my virginity at 16.
That loss of virginity had nothing to do with love, and even less to do with a “relationship.” It was simply the thing to do at the time. I sensed that, given the tide of difficulties in my family of origin, I might be leaving home soon. And I would need some currency. I wasn’t capable of loving anyone then. I would occasionally develop intense feelings of dependency, but that wasn’t love.
So, now I’m to understand that I should have known not only how to achieve my own “pleasure,” but how to demand it of my various partners! I was a silent, shy girl at that time. I was lucky people took pity on me and gave me a place to stay. I wouldn’t have known an opportunity if it chucked me under the chin. I once stopped some hippie guy from “going down” on me because I didn’t understand what he was doing, and thought it was wrong and peculiar. I said, “Let’s take a walk instead.”
Although I’ve advanced quite a bit from that attitude, I’m still not comfortable with “kink.” For one thing, my spouse has no inclination at all toward that kind of thing (that I know of). For another, it seems like something that emotionally distances one’s sex partner rather than bringing them closer. But how would I know?
I tremble at the brink of realizing that I’m OF ANOTHER GENERATION! The world of so-called “intimate relations” is changing, and I am not changing with it. Perhaps I should stop listening to Dan Savage’s “Lovecast” on my iPod, and face the facts. I’m friggin’ OLD. Even the sex advice columnists and podcasters rarely deal with those in their 60th decade! I google “older women,” and get things for women in their 40s. Physically, I feel like I’m still in my early 50s, and I look good. But my mind is all a-whirl. Once I got over my runaway stage of life, sex, for me, was proof of love. Now it’s just another art form or recreational activity. I would like to think there is something mystical or cosmic about sex. But no, those options aren’t appearing on the horizon. All I can say is, thank goodness I’m married. Things in the sex department may be old-fashioned, but at least they exist.

Expanding/Contracting New Year

My spouse and I are exchanging home offices. This means all the crap that we have each collected has to be transported several yards to another location. I already knew about my crap. I didn’t know about his. But that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that I have to DECIDE what matters. All this memorabilia; it’s kind of pointless, now that I realize no one but myself is interested. All the newspaper clippings, notes jotted in notebooks, brochures I worked on, printouts of photographs, it’s all ephemeral. It represents a person I no longer am. Sometimes I wish I was that person. That person had a lot more energy. That person was capable of following an illusion to the very end (and the end is never a dramatic cliff, but a foggy expanse of nothing). So where is it that we embark from when we embark on a new venture? It’s not exactly the same mindset that we had last year, or last week. Every night, as we sleep, we change. It may not be to our liking. Things are shuffled off and allowed to fall into some abyss. I don’t even know if I am a “writer” anymore, even though that’s what I always thought I was. I can type pretty fast, that’s all I know. I like Christmas, because it means I get some time off; but the synchronicity of expectation of goodwill with my mood is not ideal. I no longer understand any of it. It’s as if, given my age, I have no reason to get all worked up about either Solstice or Savior. What I’m worked up about is much bigger. And because it’s so big, I feel small. I will be happy to have a door I can close. At least in my new room, I’ll be in control, and therefore, cosmically larger. I am introvert; hear me roar!

Through the looking glass, without a glass

I don’t know if it’s real or not, this change that’s happened. I sit here sipping a non-alcoholic beer, not having had any regular beer or wine in eight days. In fact, I haven’t wanted any that badly. I wonder if I’m just kidding myself, or if this “sobriety” thing will stick. I’m preferring myself and my life this way. I like being in a state each evening where I can fully perceive what I’m feeling and how I’m interacting with others (and with material objects). I’m enjoying or at least tolerating my own thoughts. I’m getting more done after the regular work day is over. It’s as if I have finally realized that the person I am with a buzz on is a less sensitive, less feeling, less intelligent person. So I would like to choose the me without the buzz.
But does this mean I have to use words like “alcoholism,” and go to AA meetings? I’ve been to AA meetings in the past; I discovered that “the program” helped me lose weight, mostly because it gave me something to do and people to hang out with—people with whom I didn’t have to feign perfection or even competence. This kept me from eating between meals, somehow and, coincidentally, from drinking alcoholic beverages for about three months. I never admitted that I was “powerless,” or that I even had a “higher power.” That was 30 years ago. I’ve been drunk quite a few times since then, of course, and in recent years had settled into drinking a little every night. By a little, I mean one or two beers; two or three glasses of wine. Sometimes more. Sometimes less. But it was steady, except for the time my doctor asked me to cut back because something showed up in a test. So I stopped for a month, and it seemed easy. This time I’m stopping for no reason.
OK, there was a reason. I watched a TV show, and later, talking about the show with my husband, I realized I hadn’t understood, or perhaps hadn’t remembered the plot. This bothered me so a lot, because as a teacher of short stories, I need to keep plots in mind. Maybe it also bothered me that my husband calmly said, “I think you were buzzed, and that’s why you didn’t get it.” I don’t want to be thought of as someone who can’t “get” a TV show because she’s had too much to drink! So, I will become that other person, the smarter, more perceptive, more agile one who can remember everything. That’s the person I want to be. Can that person have a drink now and then? I don’t know yet.

Early on in the history of being a girl on earth,
The feeling comes with the song: “Get ready.”
Because you don’t know yet!
You don’t know yet what’s going to happen.
It could be anything
And that’s exciting. “Get ready, ‘cause here I come.”
Here WHO comes? Who will it be?
Your world could change with one kiss.
Or so you believe.
By “world,” you mean, a set of sentiments, layers of belief
Between what you perceive
And what those perceptions signify
In the culturally prepared environment
Of your young brain.
“Like a rolling stone,” you say.
But you’re tethered. Winding the chains around you as you roll.
“Chains of love,” family love.
Love is just another word for dysfunction.
And dysfunction is just another word for narrative.
But no one asks you for your story.
Some can live without words.

Without music, it’s more difficult.
Thoughts not worth a penny, pennies lie all around, worthless.
At the school I visited in my dream,
I ascend the stairs, only to find students in costume,
Preparing for a play, and they want to know
What my part is. But I shy away
From their eagerness, and stare out the window
Out of which I can see the football team
Marching down the road victorious, coming home.
I know it’s all classic American stuff; and as usual
I’m not invested. My approval is expected,
But not examined. I wake up, but am not awakened.

Speaking of which, have you ever heard such nonsense?
Virtual mini-gurus make pronouncements;
You are supposed to respond. No matter what your concerns,
They are wrong. The trick is to think of nothing,
Followed rapidly by writing nothing. Only then
Can you say you are awakened. Because no one will know
That you’ve said it, and therefore will not contradict you.
I can really become absorbed by the patterns in the floating grease
That come into being when I run hot water into the chicken pan.
Depending on how hot the water is, the patterns are clear or blurred.
Right now there’s no hot water in my life. The patterns are way too clear,
And have solidified. Bits of tasty meat stick to the roasting rack.
I do not retrieve them, either for the cat or for myself.